Buster Keaton

In 1928, when the whole movie industry was in turmoil over the new sound technology, Buster Keaton made what he later called “the worst mistake of my life.” Within nine years, he went from making $3,000 a week as a star to $300 a week as a gagman. And yet by the end of his life, Buster Keaton lived to see himself revered as one of the greatest screen comedians and movie directors of all time.

Joseph Frank Keaton VI was born during a wild storm in Piqua, Kansas, on Oct. 4, 1895, to a pair of struggling vaudevillians working the medicine show circuit, Joseph Hallie (Joe) Keaton and Myra Cutler Keaton.

Buster got his nickname when he was six months old - he tumbled down a flight of stairs and landed unhurt at the bottom. Another vaudevillian - reputed to have been Harry Houdini - referred to the fall as a “buster,” and the name stuck.

From 1900-1917, in what was considered the roughest knockabout act in vaudeville, the Three Keatons were stars, with Joe performing comic monologues, Myra playing the saxophone, and Buster getting tossed around the stage and doing acrobatics with his dad, using only a wooden table as a prop.

By the time Buster was entering his 20s, his father had developed a serious drinking problem, which eventually broke up the family act. Buster headed to New York in early 1917, where he met a man who would change his life.

Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle was preparing his first independent film, The Butcher Boy, when he met Keaton and offered him the chance to join his comedy troupe. The same day, Keaton made his first appearance on film, getting hit in the face with a sack of flour that knocked him off his feet. By the end of the day, he knew he wanted to work in the movies. Within a couple of films, he became Arbuckle’s co-writer and co-director as well as his co-star.

By 1920, producer Joe Schenck offered Keaton his own company. A perfectionist and unique filmmaker, Keaton shelved his first starring film, The High Sign, when it didn’t live up to his expectations, instead releasing another film, One Week, first.

His deadpan acting method was unique, and he had remarkable physical abilities, doing all his own stunts, which made him silent film’s most athletic comedian. Over the next couple of years, Keaton made 19 short films, nearly all of which are now considered tours de force of silent film comedy.

In 1923, he cautiously ventured into feature filmmaking, with Three Ages, a tri-part story about love set in Neanderthal, Roman and modern times. Keaton followed, between 1923 and 1928, with nine cutting-edge comedy features, including Our Hospitality (1923), The Navigator (1924), Sherlock Jr. (1924) and his personal favorite, The General (1926), based on the true Civil War story of the Andrews Raid.

Then, in 1928, it all fell apart. His producer, Joe Schenck (who was married to movie star Norma Talmadge, sister of Keaton’s wife, Natalie Talmadge) sold Keaton’s contract to MGM. Both Charlie Chaplin and Harold Lloyd warned Keaton against working for MGM, which had no experience making comedy films. His decision to make the move would prove to be disastrous for an independent creative artist like Keaton.

His first film for MGM, The Cameraman, was a critical and financial success. However, once that film was completed, MGM broke up Keaton’s production team and tried to fit Keaton into its patented assembly-line process of filmmaking. The loss of his creative control was devastating to Keaton, whose personal and professional life rapidly spiraled downward.

Keaton began drinking heavily; Natalie Talmadge divorced him and took away his children; his finances were in ruins; Roscoe Arbuckle died unexpectedly; and in 1933, MGM fired him. By early 1934, his drinking had become so severe that he was institutionalized. For the next few years, he floundered, eventually winding up back at MGM in 1937 as a gagman (making one-tenth of his previous salary), writing for the Marx Brothers, Red Skelton, Laurel and Hardy, and Abbott and Costello, among others.

By sheer willpower, Keaton got his drinking under control. He continued to work, making cheap “quickies” at various studios. Finally, in 1940, his personal life took a positive turn when he married film dancer Eleanor Norris: they would be happily married for 26 years.

In 1949, something happened that would bring Keaton back to the forefront. The film critic James Agee wrote a Life magazine cover story called “Comedy’s Greatest Era,” which initiated Keaton’s resurgence as a major film presence. “In his comedy,” said Agee, “there was a freezing whisper not of pathos but of melancholia. With the humour, the craftsmanship and the action there was often, besides, a fine, still and sometimes dreamlike beauty.”

Suddenly, Keaton was in demand again. He worked constantly, performing on stage in Europe and the U.S., making commercials and guest appearances on television. During this second phase of his career, he appeared in such major films as In the Good Old Summertime, Sunset Blvd,. Limelight (with Charlie Chaplin), It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and the Beach Blanket movies of the 1960s.

In 1960, he was awarded an Honorary Academy Award for “for his unique talents which brought immortal comedies to the screen.” Shortly before his death, he attended the 1965 Venice Film Festival, where he received the longest standing ovation in the history of the festival. By the time of his death in 1966, he was acclaimed as one of the best filmmakers of all time.

More important to him than all the acclaim, Buster Keaton considered his a good life. “Because of the way I looked on the stage and screen, the public naturally assumed I felt hopeless and unloved in my personal life. Nothing could be farther from the fact. As long back as I can remember, I have considered myself a fabulously lucky man.”