Billy & Joan, tailor made... Spring Fever (1927) & West Point (1928)

I’m off to see The Tailor Made Man at London’s Arts Theatre for the second time - not used to seeing musicals at all let alone more than once…it really is that good and you should go see it! So, time to put in some more “revision” on the main character: Mr William Haines one of Hollywood’s most likeable and brilliantly self-less performers.

These two light comedies were made back-to-back around the turn of 1928 and were both directed by Edward Sedgwick as vehicles for William Haines and rising co-star Joan Crawford.

Comedy shorts

Spring Fever is the clear winner with a stronger story line, more golf, wittier inter-titles and considerably more Joan than West Point. The latter film is more formulaic with Billy as the wise-cracking recruit-to-hero in military setting he was forced to play a number of times… interesting type-casting, not just given Haines’ sexuality but also the pre-occupations of the times. The US was not at war and yet it felt the need to press the importance of its military and its discipline.

Spring Fever is freed of this agenda and is a more straight-ahead hetero love story with wayward Billy being forced to submit to honest self-discipline to earn Joan’s love.

He works in a factory as under-ambitious shipping clerk, Jack Kelly, a live-for-the-moment guy who enjoys taking the mick out of his grumpy boss Mr Waters (the marvellously expressive George Fawcett) but who none-the-less keeps an eye out for his old pop (Bert Woodruff).

George Fawcett and William Haines

There’s a great sequence when Kelly walks behind his boss mimicking his every move as he grumps his way across the shop floor. Haines is just so relaxed and free in his expression; he even pinches the derrière of a male co-worker en route – out and proud!

Jack and Mr Waters share one passion in common and that is for golf, “…invented by the Dutch in an effort to make the Scotch forget bagpipes…” Jack earns time at the local golf club as a reward for teaching Mr Waters some superior technique: it’s his big break and he intends to make the most of it.

The club...

But Jack is smitten when he comes across socialite Allie Monte (Crawford) who just happens to be dating the club pro Johnson (Edward Earle). Initially unimpressed with Jack’s bluster – and his back swing at her backside – “I’ve never hit anyone on the links before…” - Allie is soon won over by his way with golf instruction.

Allie meets Jack

Jack breaks the course record and resolves to “marry for money” to secure his future. In a convoluted twist he ends up marrying Allie as she is now without her fortune, her father having lost everything… It’s one of the first decent things he’s done but Allie re-buffs his charity once she finds out.

It’s a slightly unusual structure but one that, sure enough, will give the hero another chance and one involving a golfing dénouement intrinsically linked to his romantic fortunes!

Crawford and Haines have a real rapport and his spark and her intelligence make for a winning combination of unparalleled acting energy!

Tailor Made Man makes a lot of the Marion Davies link but they could have included Ms Crawford as well – she made five silent films with Haines and was a life-long friend. Then again,  a take on Davies is one thing but Crawford has a whole lot more reputational baggage – it would be nice though to see this wide-eyed young woman reclaimed from some of the perceptions of her over-wrought later period.

Joan the, young, woman

If Sedgwick was trying to repeat the actors’ chemistry in West Point he didn’t succeed …it’s a well-made but formulaic film and there’s less logic at the heart of the story. Know-all boy meets sweet girl, then meets the army and things just meander towards a some-what forced dramatic climax which echoes Haines’ break through role in Brown of Harvard.

Haines plays Brice Wayne a playful and frankly cocky young man who isn’t about to let military service interfere with his sense of humour.

The man of a few faces...

It starts well enough on the ferry to West Point, Brice convinces some fellow recruits that he’s an officer and Haines improvises a hilarious dental inspection. Brice then tries to ingratiate himself with a pretty fellow passenger, Betty Channing (Crawford), by pretending to be blind…funnier than it sounds.

Betty turns out to be the daughter of an inn-keeper providing accommodation for recruits…had to work a female role in there somewhere.

In Haines’ earlier military vehicle, Tell it to the Marines (1926) Eleanor Boardman’s nurse was attached to the unit whilst there was also the strong lead offered by Lon Chaney who anchored the story and enabled Haines to bounce off at will.

William Haines and William Bakewell

Here we get 'Tex' McNeil, Brice’s best buddy (played by William Bakewell) who is not as butch as his name would suggest and who appears to have as much of a crush on him as Betty – is this a deliberate sub-text?

Whilst it’s love at first sight for Tex, Betty’s not immediately impressed with the cut of Brice’s jib but we soon see that he’s not as selfish as he makes himself out to be - secretly paying off a fellow recruit’s debt.

There's obviously something about a man in uniform...

But as Brice continues to kick against the imposition of Corps discipline, his sporting super-power is revealed to be football. But his success only serves to make his head swell further and to drive a wedge between Brice and his comrades.

Eventually something has to give and Brice is kicked out of the team and also resolves to resign his commission… he doesn’t feel part of the Corps and the Corps is pretty much in agreement.

It is only the intervention of the loyal Tex which persuades them to give him one more chance…It’s the big Army vs. Navy game: can Brice redeem himself and win the hearts of his comrades as well as the disaffected Betty?

The Big Game

West Point has its moments and Haines is good as per usual but things are a bit rushed and lacking in dramatic tension!

Both films are available from Warner Archives and Spring Fever in particular is worth seeking out. The print isn’t as good as West Point but is mostly decent: who wouldn’t want to play a round of “Fours” with Joan Crawford and William Haines.

The Tailor Made Man continues at the Arts Theatre until 8th April – go if you get the chance: hopefully it’ll soon get an extended run on Shaftsbury Avenue or maybe even Broadway! It deserves the chance not least for helping us remember the remarkable William Haines!

Buster Keaton in The Cameraman (1928)

Buster Keaton

I haven’t written much on here about silent comedy aside from a very short comment on Harold Lloyd’s Safety Last. Maybe I’ve been put off by the amount of material already available or possibly I don’t trust my sense of humour…

From the very start of my interest in silent films I’ve always been a Buster boy rather than a Chaplin kid… as I’ve got older this still holds true, although clearly they should both be revered. Not just two of the greatest comics but two of the greatest film-makers.

Hitching a ride

Buster Keaton seemed a lot more physically high-impact than Chaplin and, in addition to subjecting himself to grand moments of actual peril, steam engines… falling buildings…  he looked faster, harder and more robust. Less of a mime and more of a maniac!

Here is seen in a way-too-large bathing costume but there’s no disguising his muscularity. Buster was fit and he needed to be to cover the ground as he carried on into his thirties with a number of career-sustained injuries…

Buster Keaton and Marceline Day

But the most agile thing about Buster was his mind and in The Cameraman he just keeps the ideas coming. He plays an imaginary game of baseball at Yankee Stadium, taking strike, fielding and running all by himself. Waiting for the phone to ring he runs up and down the stairs - too far down to the basement and too far up the roof... When his girl does ring he runs across town at full pelt to greet her as she places the phone on the receiver.

It’s all run at relentless pace by a man at the peak of his creative fitness…Unable to find a seat on the crowded bus he rides alongside Sally on the wheel arch, then he changes alongside a much larger man in a tiny cubicle at the pool and emerges in the other man’s costume only for it to get lost underwater without him as he tumbles off the diving board. Breathless.

A little large...

The story begins as it ends, at a parade. Buster is a 10c a shot tintype photographer. He becomes entranced by a young woman he photographs (Sally, played by the elegant Marceline Day) and, after losing her in the confusion, begins a relentless search to find her. He tracks her down to the MGM news service where he attempts to get a job as a cameraman in order to impress her.

His initial attempts all end in failure as her catches a fire engine the wrong way to a warehouse fire, arrives at Yankee Stadium when they’re playing away and then double and triple exposes his film… keep winding it forward and not backward, is Sally’s advice.

A lovely Day

Sally senses something in Buster and agrees to go on a date. They have an hilarious time in the pool where Buster struggles to fight off any number of would be suitors. Then, as they walk to the beach, pro-cameraman and rival in chief, Stagg (Harold Goodwin) offers them a lift…Sally in the front of his two-seat saloon and Buster getting soaked to the skin in the third seat by the boot.

Sally tips Buster off about a potential gang fight at the Chinese New Year celebrations. At last, he’s the right man at the right time and he fearlessly films the battle, aided by a clever monkey he picked up along the way…

Man and monkey...

But, after all this it seems that Buster forgot to load his camera.  He gets the can and that looks to be very much it… We next see Buster trying to film a speed boat race. Sally and Stagg are in one of the3 boats and Stagg loses control sending both flying as his boat circles around a helpless Sally. Buster bravely goes to the rescue only for Stagg to take the credit and the girl!

But all is not lost…

Buster Keaton and Marceline Day

The Cameraman is rightly regarded as one of Keaton’s classics and possibly his last major work. He’d lost his own company by this point and was working for MGM. But, in the case of this picture at least, it did not restrict his energy and innovation. Edward Sedgwick directed the film but with a fair amount of Keaton intervention alongside the invention... a crossover point in the way these films were made.

This was the third silent film of the weekend in our house and grabbed the attention of teenagers and spouse alike: the timeless cool of Buster Keaton. Because that’s ultimately it about Mr Keaton, he is cool and intelligent. He’s relentless and nothing stops him getting where he needs to go. He doesn’t moan or get down, he takes it all with dispassionate grace and emerges ultimately triumphant and with the girl. 

The Cameraman is available as part of the Keaton Collection from TCM along with Spite Marriage and Free and Easy.