This fellow Keaton seems to be the whole show

From The Play House (1921), directed, written and produced by and starring Buster Keaton. Score by Robert Israel. There's no trick photography; "Keaton in effect split the screen into nine fragments, one for each minstrel, "courtesy of a custom-designed shuttered lightproof casing that fit over the camera. . . . To create the minstrels, the shutters simply were opened one at a time, with the film rewound in between. However, mechanical precision was not enough. It took the steady arm of cameraman Elgin Lessley -- the human metronome -- to crank each exposure at exactly the same speed. And then -- to achieve onscreen synchronicity -- Buster had to give nine flawless, identical performances. . . . One slipup -- by anyone, on any take -- would ruin the strip of film, and with it all the previous work". ('Tempest in a Flat Hat', Edward McPherson, Newmarket, 2005) http://www.busterkeaton.com

Channel: Comedy
Uploaded: January 13, 2007 at 5:46 pm
Author: babyshamblesx

Length: 03:23
Rating: 5.00
Views: 4420

Tags: 1921  buster  chaplin  cinema  comedy  film  hall  keaton  laurel  lloyd  movie  music  photography  playhouse  silent  vaudeville  

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