Reviewers on Harry Langdon: Lost & Found
“Harry Langdon, one of America's great clowns, was a little man with a strange pixie face who made his living in vaudeville playing hesitant doofusses, and then, in middle age became a silent movie comedian. He was the oddest of odd screen birds, so tiny and unaggressive he appeared to have crawled out of babydom into an adulthood he neither understood nor really achieved. He had the slowest timing and the most disconnected stares and takes of any of his ilk: a baby-man who never seems quite all there -- but whose sublime dysfunctionality, as with all great comics, reaches sheer giddy perfection. Now comes this wondrous collection from Facets. No silent movie aficionado should miss it. There are two semi-features, the 44-minute His First Flame (shot in 1925, released in 1927) and the 31-minute cut-down Soldier Man -- both somewhat misshapen but full of delights (including Harry's oddball transmutation of “The Prisoner of Zenda" in Soldier. There are 16 silent shorts from his glory years (1924-27), mostly directed by Edwards (and written by Ripley and, later, Capra), and a host of extras that includes variant versions, and a complete short with Langdon copycat Quillan. There are numerous appearances by Langdon foil and best buddy Vernon Dent, who could have been the Hardy to Harry's Laurel. Indeed, Harry's good friend Stan Laurel seems clearly to have gotten a lot of his ineffectual, ditzy Stanley from watching Harry's Harry. There are also vintage shorts, and even a Langdon home movie -- plus new scores for the films and fine rowdy commentaries from the Langdon lovers and critics assembled for both the box set and its accompanying booklet. Harry, like Buster, to a lesser degree Harold, and to even less, Charlie, was hurt by sound. His fall, like Buster's, was precipitate, but not at all deserved. This truly lovable collection restores the little man to his rightful weirdo place. (Extras: Commentaries, vintage shorts, alternative versions, booklet, photo galleries, Langdon home movies.)” --Mike Wilmington, The Daily Page
	"Among the familiar titles -- "Back to the Future," "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" -- that James H. Billington, the librarian of Congress, named to the National Film Registry last week, there was one that even hard-core cinephiles might not have recognized: "The Strong Man," a 1926 comedy directed by the young Frank Capra (his first feature- length film) and starring Harry Langdon. With his round cheeks and big eyes -- he was almost invariably described as baby-faced -- Langdon was one of the last major comedians to emerge during the silent era. His period of greatest creativity was only a few years, from 1924, when he was signed by Mack Sennett (who advertised Langdon as his "greatest comic find since Charlie Chaplin"), to 1928, when he moved to First National and ill-advisedly began directing his own films. Still, those four years were enough to produce two dozen shorts and at least three features, which display a distinctive comic personality and a revolutionary approach to silent clowning. Produced by David Kalat, "Lost and Found: The Harry Langdon Collection" is a generous four-disc set with the avowed aim of establishing Langdon alongside the Holy Trinity of silent comedy: Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd. The jury may still be out on that, but the case that Mr. Kalat presents -- which includes 20 shorts and Langdon's first feature, "His First Flame" (1927) -- is strong. At a time when comedy was still largely built around individual gags, Langdon was among the first performers to emphasize not the gag itself, but his reaction to it. The humor in a short film like "His Marriage Wow" (1925) doesn't lie in the conventional Sennett car chase that serves as its climax, but in the emotion that plays across Langdon's nimble face: not bug-eyed mock terror, but a blinking, wide- eyed wonder. He's like a child confronted with a strange new phenomenon, not quite able to determine whether it's good or bad. On screen, Langdon is a symphony of hesitations, of half-finished gestures and last-minute reconsiderations: devices he uses to draw us into his head, challenging us to follow his looping mental processes. Sennett, by and large, surrounds his new star with the standard-issue slapstick that had served him well since the Keystone Kops. Langdon's genius lies in internalizing it. But there's another, more problematic side to Langdon's exaggeratedly innocent comic persona. An overgrown infant, he seems to toddle rather than walk, his slight figure lost in oversize clothes. Put a few more pounds on him, and his man-child demeanor wouldn't seem out of place in a Judd Apatow film -- he's the original 40-year-old virgin -- and there is something similarly Apatovian in his relationship to women. They come in two basic types in Langdon's work : the girlish sweetheart who suddenly becomes a dominating wife (often played by Marceline Day) or the slithering vamp wreathed in cigarette smoke (Madeline Hurlock in many of the shorts, including the deliriously Oedipal "His New Mamma"). Nothing inspires fear and loathing in Langdon like the figure of an adult woman, yet his sex drive remains oddly, queasily pronounced. Stan Laurel, who as a young comic was much influenced by Langdon (and later collaborated with him as a writer), was able to instill an endearing sense of presexuality in the character he created in his teamwork with Oliver Hardy. Not so Langdon, whose precocious desires remain on occasionally off-putting display. " --Dave Kehr, New York Times "Harry Langdon was among the most polarizing figures in movie comedy history – either you thought he was an equal to Chaplin and Keaton, or you found him to be limited and monotonous. Langdon never inspired middle ground, which may explain why his star burned so quickly and briefly in the tail end of the silent era. Too much focus on Langdon’s career centers on his starring feature films. This DVD collection ignores those titles in favor of a rare opportunity to appreciate Langdon’s short films with Mack Sennett (the films that actually fueled his rise) and some of his later sound era shorts when he was considered a has-been (which is strange, since the films are actually quite entertaining). Langdon’s odd persona of the innocent yet infantile adult seemed out of place amidst the freneticism of the silent comedy genre, where speed and feral action ruled. In many ways, his Sennett shorts are superior to his features since it offers Langdon’s character in smaller doses that are easier to accept. Indeed, the Sennett formula focuses on slapstick comedy, with no emphasis on the pathos that Langdon unwisely insisted upon in his features (and which, ultimately, killed his career). In this world, Langdon’s slow-moving, slow-witted character is at perfect odds with the chaos around him, and the contrast makes the comedy all the funnier. The real surprise here are the sound films. Langdon, a theater veteran before heading to Hollywood, had a fine voice and had no problem adapting to sound. But his career already tanked prior to coming of sound, so he was already a has-been by the time the silent era ended. Although relegated to cheap shorts, including an industrial film for a tire company, he managed to give new dimension to his oddball screen persona through dialogue. Sound made Langdon’s character into a loopy, somewhat addled-brained adult at odds with the world, and this was funnier than his oversized child routine in the silent era. It is a pity that he was never able to re-establish his star standing during his lifetime, since he was obviously more versatile than many people insisted. The DVD also provides a documentary on Langdon’s career that is funnier than the Langdon films: a group of film historians sit around talking about Langdon, but we don’t get to see the films they are mentioning. At one point, three film historians are sitting on someone’s bed while discussing the intricacies of the Langdon mystique. It makes for baffling viewing, to be certain, but Langdon would have probably been amused by the absurdity of the situation. --Phil Hall, Film Threat "Having received my pre-release screener copy of the HARRY LANGDON LOST AND FOUND DVD set (thank-you David), and being also unfortunately laid up with an attack of sciatica giving me plenty of time to watch DVD's in bed, I have given this set a pretty thorough look-see in the last few days,and I wanna tell-ya Folks, it's damn good. The speeds are right, the scores work, a lot of my friends and compadres in the Silent Comedy Mafia (as well as myself)are yappin on the commentary tracks and in the booklet notes and one can now hold in their hot little hands a pretty comprehensive look at Harry Langdon's Sennett work as well as get a taste of what he was like in talkies. Harry has deserved this for a long time, and it's finally here. I await the usual whining that some of the prints are not pristine and this or that frame may be missing (in fact, I realize that I have about 30 seconds more of the HORACE GREELEY JR/CACTUS CAL clip that David could have used, and an even better print of LOVE, HONOR AND OBEY THE LAW, but who cares, I whack myself for bringing it up), but the hell with them, we who know know that these are what survives in the material, or are amazed at what turned up for this reissue and also know just how much improvement on the original materials David has put into the video transfers. Now there is at least a new and improved version HIS FIRST FLAME that looks far better than the old Morcraft version (no Waveyboy, there ain't any more of the missing footage ,but whats there is all sparkly and bright now, so get over it and buy one, it's the best you most likely ever gonna see and better than you deserve),and there are so many rare goodies like THE HANSOM CABMAN, a near complete LUCK OF THE FOOLISH, a SEA SQUAWK that kicks the hell out of the old Rohauer version, a rare complete print of PICKING PEACHES (from my collection BTW)and frankly fine versions at good pace of all the standard Langdon classics like SATURDAY AFTERNOON, ALL NIGHT LONG, FIDDLESTICKS, HIS MARRIAGE WOW etc, giving the average viewer who might stumble across this material a fair chance to discover Langdon at his best oppportunity in decades to get his laughs. Did I say I liked the music? I've gotta admit Kalat, I was a bit worried on that score, or scores. As hater of all orchestrations Alloy, I was made a bit nervous by the Snark Ensembles somewhat european slant, but as one who also enjoys it when someone takes a chance, goes out on that proverbial limb, and succeeds (hell, this is why I love Langdon), I have to say that the Snark takes a chance, but finds themselves in tune with Langdon's wonderful off-timing, and the Redvine Jazz Band does good work too, and Andrew Simpson sounds like he has the potential to be another grand new find as a silent film accompanist. There were scores I liked better than others, but there was nothing here I disliked, no one has to hide if they see me coming. So if you haven't ordered one yet, do so now, it's terrific, and I 'm proud to have been a part of it. It's also kinda cool to think(and I think David will agree with me here) that a lot of the neatness of this set came about through the auspices of Slapsticon and Silent Comedians.com. Bravo David Kalat, Bravo all of you who contributed to it. Good jobs all around. It felt really good to be laying here in my pain-killer drug-induced misery and watch this set and the new Disney Oswald the Rabbit set, which also manages to do it right, the right speeds, good scores by Robert Israel, and rare films we thought we might never see now easily accessible in ones living room for less than the price of a meal for two at Dennys. We are all truly living in another Golden Age of Silent Film, you'd all better realize just how lucky you are, or you'd better slap yourselves upside the head if you don't. Enjoy it Gang, who knows how long it's gonna last. So, what do we do next?" RICHARD M ROBERTS "With a slow blink, the pale, toddler-faced comedian Harry Langdon could express anything from mild reproach to major shock. Childish, wizened and badly dressed, this "white mouse," as historian Kevin Brownlow called him, stumbled through life's minefield. Sex lured him and demolished him; women ate him alive and spat him out. Onscreen, Langdon (1884–1944) was a Taoist comedian, carried along by whatever flow of power came his way. "I'm an animated suit of clothes," he once said, and throughout his silent work he took the path of least resistance. All Day Entertainment/Facets Video's lovingly assembled four-disc set Harry Langdon: Lost and Found follows the formative years of the one of the most major, yet least known, of silent comics. Years later, after Langdon was a second banana in Poverty Row shorts, producer Mack Sennett described Langdon as "my most important discovery"—and this was from the person who'd promoted Charlie Chaplin. There's a lot to be learned from this collection. One lesson is that no matter how much we lionize the best silent comedians—Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd—the 20-year reign of silent comedy was a symbiotic free-for-all of styles, with borrowing and theft on all corners. Langdon dressed like Chaplin in too-tight or too-loose thrift-shop finery, though the mauled felt hat was his own personal signature. Like Harold Lloyd he could be a wet-behind-the-ears go-getter. Like Buster Keaton, he faced disaster with a fixed look of resignation. Maybe Langdon might scratch a mild itch somewhere on his head as he waited for the wrecking ball to fall. Or perhaps he'd give up his most lethal reaction shot: a myopic twitch of his eyelids. Langdon haters, and there are plenty of them, complain that Langdon never does anything. "It takes him an hour to get started," Frank Capra recalled complaining to Mack Sennett. Critic James Agee, the first partisan to revive Langdon's reputation, put it best: Lloyd, Chaplin and Keaton were more like each other than Langdon was like the rest of them. And Langdon, a comedian's comedian—was a great minimalist who paved the way for generations of anti-comedians to come: Andy Kaufman, Steve Martin and especially Pee-wee Herman. This collection includes Langdon in 16 two-reel Sennett comedies made 1924–26, and two slightly longer feature films, Soldier Man and His First Flame. The former, a burlesque of The Prisoner of Zenda with Harry in a dual role as a lost soldier and King Strudel XIII of Bomania, is presented in a 31-minute version of a four-reel original. (A silent film reel is around 12 minutes long; sound reels are shorter.) The release of this film by Sennett, after Langdon had gone to First National studios, contributed to the late 1920s glut of Langdon films—and that glut is perhaps one reason for Langdon's demise as a star. But this retrospective of Langdon at Sennett's laugh factory shows how he rose to the top. His first exhibited film with Sennett has Harry as a debonair letch in the 1924 two-reeler Picking Peaches. Smile Please, a scintillatingly gauche piece of Sennettry (complete with performing goat and skunk), could have starred any boisterous comedian and worked just as well. And yet just six months later, in the brilliant 19-minute short All Night Long, Langdon was recognizably himself. He plays a pale boob who always lucks out, in a finely structured tale alternating between a World War I battlefield and a chance meeting in a deserted theater. Here, Langdon was adept in what Capra called "the principle of the brick." It's a theory that has much to disprove it, as we can see—Langdon threw his share of projectiles. But Capra's idea was that Langdon might be the agent of malign fate (a brick hitting a bully in the head), but he must never toss the brick himself. All Night Long starred Langdon's regular partner, Vernon Dent—a hulking brute with a head like a cannonball—who usually got brickstruck. (Dent later used his heavyweight grouching skills in many a Three Stooges short; I remember the Ibsenish, brooding quality he brought to the role of Mr. Panther, head of the Panther Brewing Company, in the Stooges short Beer Barrel Polecats.) Dent and Langdon were a top-drawer comedy team, closer to Penn and Teller than Laurel and Hardy. Saying that, it should be noted that there was much symbiosis between Stan Laurel and Langdon—Laurel borrowed some of Langdon's mannerisms and later hired Langdon as a writer on Laurel and Hardy's Hal Roach films. The better of the two longer feature films in the collection is 1927's His First Flame, the story of a rich simp who is persuaded away from girls by his bitter fireman uncle (Dent). It's a series of short, violent hideo-comic tales about the war between men and women; the most dire incident has a wife forcing two men to eat at her dinner table at knife point. His First Flame shows significant technical improvement over Sennett films made just two years before. The focus of the camera is deep, and the build-ups are deliriously slow. The scenes of a drowsy 1920s Los Angeles are irreplaceable; and there's enough clarity in the foreground to see something as small as a pair of teardrops on a floor. This collection reveals Langdon evolving before the camera in record time. After this feature, Langdon left for First National and a short period of world-class fame. So what happened? Sound, of course. Langdon talked like a squeakier Lou Costello. A funny voice, but it wasn't the funny voice that an audience might have though he had. Langdon was older than the other three famous silent clowns and thus hit harder by the years to come. Capra, always glad to appropriate credit, told everyone who would listen that Langdon was a talent Capra had shepherded. In Capra's version, Langdon went off the rails after he started to believe his own reviews. It was the saddest show-biz story in Capra's recollection, and that's the way it was repeated in his often truth-impaired autobiography The Name Above the Title. One of the commentators in Lost and Found, a 74-minute documentary in this set, suggests that Langdon's second wife, Helen Watson, may have been the one who encouraged Harry into bad career decisions. Certainly Watson bled Harry for alimony whenever the aging comedian got ahead. But repeatedly—conclusively—this collection argues that Capra may have been a valued contributor to Langdon's comic art, but he wasn't the man who shaped Langdon's fog-bound persona. Moreover, there's much proof that Langdon still kept his talent post-Capra. In addition to commentary tracks and extras, there are two 1933 shorts for the bare-budget Educational Films, which also hired Keaton after Buster's career crash. In 1933's Knight Duty, Langdon works on some prime gags in a deserted wax museum; he and Dent (as a hulking policeman) handsomely survive stodgy direction and a female lead who genuinely belonged in a waxworks. Love, Honor and Obey (The Law) is a B.F. Goodrich–produced promotional short from 1935 co-starring Langdon with snazzy, fox-faced comic Monte Collins. Despite its disagreeable title, it qualifies as the funniest driver-training film ever made. Langdon, first drunk, then hung-over, is required not to get a single traffic ticket since he's getting married to the daughter of the chief of police. The shorts are scored with newly recorded soundtracks by the Snark Ensemble and the Redwine Jazz Band. Clarinetist Ben Redwine is involved in both, and he's perhaps the best interpreter of nontrad silent-comedy scoring since the Club Foot Orchestra. While he uses the traditional ragtime tempos, he gets into more rarefied modes that range from klezmer and Brubeck. The collection leaves you wanting more. Langdon worked in Columbia two-reelers during the '30s and '40s in the same comedy shorts division where the Three Stooges were flourishing. We don't get to see any of it here, except in stills. In the documentary, there are no excerpts from Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, Long Pants or Langdon's most universally appealing film, The Strong Man. Langdon's Heart Trouble doesn't seem to exist anymore—except in the sense that its press kit is included here as a CD-ROM. And what about Three's a Crowd—a kind of situation tragedy in which Langdon is billed as "The Odd Fellow"? It, too, is praised during interviews but can't be shown. Once again, copyright extensions do their part to keep films hidden. (Thanks, Sonny Bono, wherever you are.) Still, as labor of love and robustly argued defense of the reputation of the least-known of the Big Four, Harry Langdon: Lost and Found is the kind of silent-film rediscovery that you wouldn't have thought was possible at this late a date. Richard von Busack, Metro-active The Harry Langdon Collection-Lost and Found Content: A      Picture: B      Sound: B      Extras: A Intro:  This beautiful four disc set is a loving tribute to a forgotten comedy star from the silent film era, Harry Langdon. This wide eyed, innocent, baby faced comedian was at one time compared to Chaplin, Harold Lloyd, Charlie Chase and Stan Laurel. Content: This dvd set includes restored footage of his Max Sennett and Hal Roach short films (20 in all), his first feature film and extras such as a musical short and home movie collection. AllDay Entertainment spent a lot of time restoring some of the rare footage seen, using foreign editions when necessary. It's a small miracle they have been able to collect as much as they did, as some of his films have been lost forever. Langdon's career took off when he was signed by Sennett when the public got tired of the Keystone Cops slapstick comedies Sennett was used to making. He tauted Langdon as the next Chaplin, as Langdon's humor was much more subtle and calm compared to Sennett's other comedies. Some of the Langdon's shorts during this time were directed by a young Frank Capra. But Sennett's reputation for being a cheapskate when it came to paying his stars made Langdon look for greener pastures and he soon tried to direct his own films, which led to a n early downfall. Later on, he signed up with Educational Studios and Columbia, where he was teamed with Vernon Dent, who was featured, along with Langdon a Three Stooges shorts. The portly Dent was a perfect foil for Langdon. Picture & Sound: This dvd set is an absolute joy for classic film fans, who get to see one of Hollywood's forgotten stars in his prime. Both silent and sound shorts are featured in this collection. Picture quality is variable but some of the film footage had to be literally rescued from destruction. Some of the footage are taken from the last surviving prints so don't expect a pristine picture. Silent footage has great piano soundtracks to enhance their viewing enjoyment. Extras: A wonderful package accompanies these four discs-The cover is heavy duty cardboard booklet style with a disc on inside plastic "pages". Also included is the package is a 20 page booklet about the contents (how often do you get that these days) that includes essays and pictures about Langdon and the silent era of comedy. The discs themselves include commentaries from film historians, and disc four has a 74 minute documentary about Langdon and his career. Summary: All silent film buffs will thoroughly enjoy this long overdue dvd set of one of silent films greatest comedians. Besides rare footage and restored short films, the package includes a ton of extras making this a great value. DVD Corner CRITICAL MASS: Nervous laughter Silent-film comic Harry Langdon had a rise and fall worthy of Shakespeare Facets has released a four-DVD set, Lost and Found: The Harry Langdon Collection ($39.95), which collects most of the silent comedian's work for Mack Sennett's Keystone Studios along with a featurelength documentary on his life and films. Should you care? Maybe, although to watch a silent movie in the 21st century might rightly be regarded as perverse. Silent movies seem quaint to us because the dramatic style (informed by the conventions of the Victorian stage) in combination with the technical immaturity of the form (the generally static camera, prosaic editing and proscenium framing of shots) is likely to distance a modern viewer from the experience. Because we cannot forget we are watching "an old movie," we can't experience the sort of transport available when swept up in a film. While those with a serious interest in film might genuinely enjoy these, that pleasure derives in part from our appreciation of the technical limitations of early filmmakers and their historical significance. A taste for silent movies is as much an acquired affectation as a fondness for single malt Scotch or professional ice hockey. That doesn't mean there aren't primary and ancillary delights available in watching a silent film - it's not hard to enjoy Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton or Harold Lloyd, even as you're engaged by the history. While Langdon's name might not register with a general audience, there's an old argument about whether he should be regarded - along with Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd - as the fourth great film comedian of the silent era. In circles where such questions are entertained, Langdon is a polarizing figure. There are those who think it blasphemous that any other comedian be mentioned in the same breath as the triumvirate. There are those who might argue for another candidate - Charlie Chase or tragic Fatty Arbuckle - over Langdon. And there are Langdon advocates who argue that Langdon was the most subtle and modern of the great silent clowns, a intuitive comic who pioneered the humor of anxiety and discomfiture - a spiritual antecedent to John Belushi's Bluto Blutarsky or Rowan Atkinson's Mr. Bean (without the mean streak) - rather than physical slapstick. Maybe the best case for Langdon is made by contemporary accounts. Mack Sennett once said he considered Langdon the best comedian he'd ever seen. In 1925, Photoplay described Langdon as the comedians' comedian: "Ask Harold Lloyd who gives him his biggest celluloid laugh. Ask any star. They will all say Langdon." But Langdon's career as a star was relatively short - he did most of his acting in the sound era, and after his starring role in the 1928 silent feature Heart Trouble it was 12 years before he landed another big role, in the Poverty Row comedy Misbehaving Husbands, where he played a character who bore little resemblance to the unsettling man-child which made him, for a time, famous. Langdon's comedic persona was that of a baby trapped in a man's body, with a full complement of adult urges but a child's innocence and incomplete understanding. He was habitually ineffectual, profoundly stupid, yet highly favored by luck - or God. Frank Capra, who directed Langdon in his first three (and most successful) feature films, once described Langdon's character - whom Capra insisted was invented for Langdon rather than by him - as someone who "couldn't outsmart anyone. Only God was on his side. God was his ally and took him through life because he was so innocent." "Chaplin depended on wit to get himself out of trouble," Capra said. "Harold Lloyd on speed and Keaton on pure stoicism. But Langdon's character had the mind of a child and a very slow child at that ... Wit, speed, stoicism, innocence - one word each for those four great comedians." CITY LIGHTS It is ironic that Langdon should be considered the innocent of the group - he was nearly 40 and an established vaudeville star when he decided to try his hand at films. He'd been working the boards since his early teens, first with a touring outfit called Dr. Belcher's Kickapoo Indian Medicine Show and subsequently with the Gus Sun Minstrels and other medicine shows and small-time circuses. Langdon was a jack of all arts - a musician and blackface minstrel, a gymnast, tumbler and trapeze artist. In 1903 he married fellow performer Rose Musolffi and worked up an act featuring a recalcitrant automobile or two (sometimes three) called Johnny's New Car. (They worked variations of this act for 20 years, and Rose Langdon carried the auto theme through her solo career after Harry left for Hollywood.) By the early 1920s Harry Langdon had become an established show-business personality, starring in Broadway musicals. Buoyed by his success, he approached Hollywood comedy producer Hal Roach. When negotiations with Roach broke off - Langdon's price was too high - he signed a contract with Sol Lesser's Principal Pictures. He first starred in two-reel comedies directed by Alf Goulding, but in October 1923 the struggling studio granted him a release from his contract. Almost immediately Sennett signed Langdon to a Keystone Studio contract. Sennett obviously respected Langdon's experience, allowing him unprecedented artistic freedom and assigning him his own production team to make shorts - many of which are included in the Facets collection. Langdon seemed to begin his new career cautiously. He adhered to the Sennett formula of bathing beauties and sight gags through his first efforts but seemed to find his footing in late 1924, when Harry Edwards took over as director and the focus was placed more squarely on babyfaced Langdon's tentative character. In 1925 Capra joined Langdon's team as a writer - his first credited contribution was on Plain Clothes - and a formidable partnership was born. The ambitious Langdon was determined to follow Chaplin and Keaton, who'd made the jump from shorts to featurelength films. It was time for him to leave Sennett. Langdon signed a three-year deal with Lesser's new First National Pictures (which later merged with Warner Bros.) to produce two features annually for a fixed fee per film. His first comedy, Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, was directed by Edwards and co-written by Capra. While the film was a box office success, it ran over budget and Edwards took the fall. Langdon installed Capra as director in his next picture, The Strong Man, in which Langdon played the weakling assistant of a vaudeville strongman. During the production of his next picture, Long Pants (1927), in which Langdon played an infantilized man kept in knee pants by his protective parents until the eve of his engagement, Langdon and Capra had a falling out over the somewhat dark tone of screenwriter Arthur Ripley's work. Capra found it depressive and wanted a more optimistic tone. Langdon sided with Ripley, broke with Capra, and decided to direct himself. And never again approached the success he had experienced. The legend, as summarized by Andrew Sarris in his 1998 book You Ain't Heard Nothing Yet, The American Talking Film History and Memory, 1927-1998, is that the coming of sound and Langdon's hubris combined to ruin him: "Langdon resented the credit given Capra and Edwards, and dispensed with their writing and directing services to follow in the presumed path of Chaplin, Keaton, and Lloyd as a supposedly solitary auteur. The result was a series of personal and professional disasters that left Langdon penniless by 1931. Like Keaton, he subsisted on comic bit parts through the 1930s and '40s." THE PLAYER The shorts in the Facets collection cast some light on what might be the central mystery of the enigmatic Langdon: Where did this indelible (and admittedly creepy) onscreen persona come from? Capra contended that "we" - himself and Sennett - "invented a character for him. It was this elfin character, a man-child." Others tend to give Langdon more credit. In his seminal 1949 Life magazine essay on silent comedy, "Comedy's Greatest Era," that rescued Langdon from obscurity, James Agee wrote: "The minute Frank Capra saw him he begged Sennett to let him work with him. Langdon was almost as childlike as the character he played. He had only a vague idea of the story or even of each scene as he played it; each time he went before the camera Capra would brief him on the general situation and then, as this finest of intuitive improvisers once tried to explain his work, 'I'd go into my routine.' The whole tragedy of the coming of dialogue, as far as these comedians were concerned - and one reason for the increasing rigidity of comedy ever since - can be epitomized by the mere thought of Harry Langdon confronted with a script." Agee went on to attribute to Capra the secret for working with this particular kind of natural: "Langdon might be saved by the brick falling on the cop, but it was verboten that he in any way motivate the brick's fall." Though Capra went on to considerable success, he never completely got over what he saw as his betrayal by Langdon. In 1977, speaking to the American Film Institute, he gave this uncharitable version of their history together: "Harry didn't know his own character. When Harry came to Sennett's he was a middle-aged guy who had made a little living for years doing a vaudeville act with his wife. They had a little truck that they took around and they made enough to live on. They weren't of very high intelligence. Now when we invented his innocent character, and he became innocence personified, he shot to the top. Then he read in the papers that he was the equivalent to Chaplin. Boy, that was the wrong thing for him to see because right away he wanted to do what Chaplin did. Chaplin wrote, directed and acted. But Chaplin discovered his own character, so he knew more about the character than anybody else in the world. Langdon knew less about his character than anybody in the world, but that poor man decided he would fire me and everyone else because he wanted to play the witty guy like Chaplin. And that's what he did and what caused his downfall. It was the only real honest-to-goodness human tragedy that I have personally seen from start to finish. He was playing extras when he died of a broken heart. The big star who never understood what made him funny." The point is that he was funny - in a weird and sometimes queasy-making way. Agee once compared him to a consummate musician. "Langdon had one queerly toned, unique little reed," Agee wrote, "but out of it he could get incredible melodies." E-mail: Philip Martin, The Arkansas Gazette
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