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Roscoe Conkling (Fatty) Arbuckle (March 24 1887 – June 29 1933) was an American silent film comedian. He was given the nickname Fatty (a name he detested and used only professionally) because he was fat. Arbuckle was one of the most popular actors of his era, but is best known today for his central role in the so-called "Fatty Arbuckle scandal."
Birth, Girth and Early Career Born in the small town of Smith Center, Kansas, to Mollie and William Goodrich Arbuckle; he had several years of Vaudeville experience, including work at Idora Park in Oakland, California, under his belt when he began his film career with the Selig Polyscope Company in July 1909. He reluctantly acquired the moniker "Fatty" due to his sizeable girth. He appeared sporadically in Selig one-reelers until 1913, moving briefly to Universal Pictures before becoming a star in the Keystone Kops comedies for producer-director Mack Sennett. On August 6, 1908, he married Araminta Estelle Durfee (1889-1975), the daughter of Charles Warren Durfee and Flora Adkins. Durfee played leading lady in numerous early comedy films under the name "Minta Durfee," often with Arbuckle. Size and skill Despite his size, Arbuckle was physically adept and surprisingly agile. His comedies are known for being rollicking, fast-paced, full of chase scenes and having many sight gags. Arbuckle was particularly fond of the famous "pie in the face," a cliché that has come to signify silent film comedy in general. In fact, the earliest known use of the "pie in the face" in a Hollywood movie was in the June 1913 Keystone one-reeler A Noise from the Deep, starring Arbuckle and frequent screen partner Mabel Normand. A legend has Arbuckle creating the gag after a chance encounter with Pancho Villa's army on the Rio Grande during a Vaudeville appearance in El Paso, Texas. The story claims the Arbuckles, picnicking on the river, and the Villa men playfully threw fruit at each other across the river, with Roscoe knocking one of Villa's men off his horse with a bunch of bananas, to Villa's own extreme amusement. Buster Keaton Arbuckle gave Buster Keaton his first experience of film-making in his 1917 short, The Butcher Boy. The two men also became close friends off the set. The friendship between Arbuckle and Keaton never wavered, even when Arbuckle was beset by tragedy at the zenith of his career, and through the period of depression and downfall that followed. In his autobiography, Keaton described Arbuckle's playful nature and his love of practical jokes, including several elaborately constructed schemes the two successfully pulled off at the expense of various Hollywood studio heads and stars. Scandal
Second marriage On January 27, 1925, he divorced Araminta Estelle Durfee in Paris. She had charged desertion. He then married Doris Deane on May 16, 1925. Late career Arbuckle tried to return to moviemaking, but the ban on his pictures came too soon after his acquittal to allow for that, and he retreated into alcoholism—in the words of his first wife, "Roscoe only seemed to find solace and comfort in a bottle." Buster Keaton attempted to help Arbuckle by letting him work on Keaton's films. Arbuckle wrote the story of the Keaton short "Day Dreams." Arbuckle allegedly co-directed scenes in Keaton's Sherlock, Jr., but it is unclear how much of this footage made it through to the final film. Arbuckle also directed a number of comedy shorts for Educational Pictures featuring lesser-known comics of the day under the pseudonym William Goodrich. A discredited but persistent legend gives an inaccurate explanation for the origin of Arbuckle's pseudonym. Allegedly, Keaton (an inveterate punster) suggested that Arbuckle should become a director under the alias "Will B. Good." Supposedly, Arbuckle agreed but—recognizing that the pun was too obvious—he expanded the name to "William B. Goodrich." This story appears to be false. Arbuckle directed dozens of films in which his pseudonym is clearly listed in the opening credits as "William Goodrich" ... lacking the middle initial. Author David Yallop has uncovered that Arbuckle's father's full name was William Goodrich Arbuckle; this thus seems the most likely source of the alias. The "Will B. Good" story, in all its improbability, does indeed reinforce the fondness for puns shared by both Keaton and Arbuckle. Third marriage In 1929 Doris Deane sued for divorce in Los Angeles, charging desertion and cruelty. On June 21, 1931, Roscoe married Addie Oakley Dukes McPhail, later Addie Oakley Sheldon (1906-2003) in Erie, Pennsylvania. Shortly before that marriage, Arbuckle signed a contract with Jack Warner to star in six two-reel Vitaphone short comedies, using his own name. He finished filming the last of the two-reelers on June 28, 1933, and was signed by Warner Brothers to make a feature-length film just hours before he died. Arbuckle's six Vitaphone shorts, filmed in Brooklyn, constitute the only recordings of his voice. Silent-film comedian Al St. John (Arbuckle's nephew) and actors Lionel Stander and Shemp Howard each appeared with Arbuckle in one apiece of the six shorts. Sadly, when Warner Brothers attempted to release the first of these six shorts ("Hey, Pop!") in Britain, the British film board—citing the scandal of more than a decade earlier—refused to grant it an exhibition certificate. Death Roscoe Arbuckle died from heart failure on June 29, 1933, in Hollywood. He was only 46 years old. Buster Keaton stated repeatedly that Arbuckle died of a broken heart. The same day he died, he had just filmed two new comedy reels, and he was reported to say "This is the best day of my life." He was cremated and his ashes scattered in the Pacific Ocean. (It is Macklin Arbuckle, an early screen actor reputed to be Roscoe Arbuckle's cousin, who is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery, Bronx, New York.) Museum of Modern Art Retrospective In April and May of 2006, the Museum of Modern Art in New York City mounted a huge 56-film, month-long retrospective of most of Arbuckle's surviving work, taking the unprecedented step of running the entire series twice in a row for additional emphasis. Highlights included The Rounders (1914) with Charles Chaplin and Fatty and Mabel's Simple Life (1915) with Mabel Normand. Media See also Further reading Selected coverage in the New York Times | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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