Madeline Hurlock

An appreciative, uncritical look at silent film comedies and thrillers from early in the century through the 1920s.

A compilation featuring comedic stars of the silent era including Will Rogers, Laurel and Hardy, and the Keystone Cops.

Billy Bevan and Andy Clyde play hobos who hop onto a train where they are hired. Their misadventures lead to chaos, blending mistaken identity with classic physical comedy.

A concert pianist who is popular with women tries to discourage a teenage admirer.

Billy works at a film studio where lots of things keep going wrong. First, while filming, the camera man and director nearly get dropped off a building. This stunt is funny and rather realistic. Second, Billy looks in a keyhole at what he THINKS is a lady taking a bath--and she's soon joined by a man!

A small town princess gets hired for the movies.

Billy Bevan in a hell of a lot of chaos!

Wanda is a gum-chewing waitress; dim Eddie, the pastry boy at the café, likes her. So does Mr. Hamhocks, the café owner, whose head is also turned by the arrival of Pearl Minnow, a gold digger in town for the annual Catalina Channel Swim, sponsored by Wrigley's. Wanda and Pearl take a dislike to each other; Hamhocks is charmed by Pearl and Eddie stays loyal to Wanda. The day of the swimming contest arrives, the two women compete, and the two men try to help their respective gals. Their trials and tribulations mix with documentary footage of the event. An angry swordfish gets in the act.

Where's My Wandering Boy This Evening? is a comedy short released in 1923

Love at First Flight is a 1928 comedy short.

An island princess falls in love with a young man whose picture she sees in the newspaper. Her father, the king, sends his agents to the U.S. to kidnap the man and bring him back to the islands to marry his daughter. Complications ensue.

To make her boyfriend jealous a society girl starts dating a plumber but his sweetheart gets revenge.

Harry and Marcie are on a train headed for a new job. There's comedy in the berths and during Harry's morning shave, then a thief steals the money Harry needed for his new job, so he has to go back to being a beat cop and Marcie works as a seamstress. One evening, she delivers a dress to a party; a Lothario asks the hostess to get Marcie to stay. Outside the same house, Harry the cop is investigating strange noises. Thieves, bombs, a wallet, a swimming pool, and misunderstandings figure in the luck of our foolish but winsome pair.

Mild-mannered Harry gets roughed up by a slum gang. Later he returns as a cop to see that justice is done.

Officer Eddie Chase, a young policeman whose romantic interests and bumbling antics with Maizie Marlboro drive the "love" element mentioned in the title.

Romance hits a football player when he falls for an aviatrix.

Two circus hands create chaos.

Pitfalls of a Big City is a 1923 short comedy

With her winnings from an essay contest, a waitress gets dolled up and goes to a swanky resort to snag a millionaire husband.

Adonis, the King of Bullomania's personal chauffeur, is in love with Princess Ernestine, the King's daughter. To win her heart, he accepts to fight bulls at the bullfighting school. But the princess is also courted by Manuel Risotto, a famous toreador who kidnaps her. The King chases after him in a car driven by Adonis. Unfortunately, the chauffeur lets Risotto run away. In a rage, the King condemns Adonis to the death penalty. But it is without counting a scientist who has invented a rocket, his assistant who falls down in the yard of Adonis's prison, a great escape featuring Adonis and the assistant disguised as bulls, a second abduction of the Princess - but, this time for the just cause of love -, a wild chase and a final flight to another planet!

Our hero is the town's photographer and its sheriff. He' in love with a young woman who's also pursued by the older, more devious Dudley Somerset. First our hero must do a few heroic things, saving the lass from danger. He must also not move too quickly on the romantic front. Once she's willing to marry him, he must balance the duties of groom with that of sheriff, while Dudley tries to convince the lass that our hero is untrue to her...

Fleeing a group of forest rangers, who are rounding up tramps to serve as firefighters, they take refuge in a mansion. The owner has gone on vacation and the servants are away, so Hardy pretends to be the owner and offers to rent the house to an English couple. Hardy gets Laurel to pose as the maid. Unfortunately, the owner returns and tells the would-be renters that he owns the house; Laurel and Hardy then flee again and are caught by the rangers and forced to fight wildfires.

Asleep at the Switch is a 1923 comedy short.

Hapless pilot Billy manages to raise himself from KP duty to flying ace. He manages to wreck havoc on the German Air Force and return home a hero!

A roguish baron saves a girl from a carriage accident, and brings her to a backwoods Inn during a storm for refuge. There he hopes to have his way with her. She's actually the queen traveling incognito, which the loyal residents recognize. The cross-eyed baron keeps getting caught trying to get into the queen-then the inn keeper's wife's bedroom.

A short packed with more stars and gags than most features of its day, this film delivered a gaggle of guffaws!

The plot has Ben Turpin as the prince of a mythical country who is being forced to wed a princess not of his choosing. In 1947, an outfit headed by J.J.Balaber, called Grand International Pictures, acquired 1,300,000 feet of Mack Sennet films with the intentions of editing 26 short comedies from them. The first of these was a 13 minute short edited from "When a Man's A Prince" and released on June 18,1947 as the first of the "Americana Comedy Film Classic Series."

For Sale, a Bungalow is a 1927 comedy short

Billy inherits a major department store, but has to pretend not to be married in order to claim it - which doesn't sit too well with his wife.

The Raspberry Romance is a 1925 comedy short.

The movie makers are filming the next installment of the western serial "Get Your Man". The movie's leading man wants his stunt double to do the next dangerous stunt. Purely by accident, a hapless, cross-eyed aspiring actor named Joe Magee ends up doing the stunt perfectly. He ends up doing dangerous stunt after stunt, all by accident, that fit the movie so perfectly that the movie's leading lady wants him in the picture. The exasperated director finds that getting Joe to do the stunts on command is an entirely different story.

Professor Brawn has been swinging a dumbbell for so long he looks like one!

Energetic college student Eddie navigates a series of comedic mishaps, both slapstick and romantic as he get use to life on campus.

One Spooky Night is a 1924 comedy short

Ben returns from the big city with his pockets full of cash. A hard-hearted, gold-digging vamp ensnares him. Ben enjoys being ensnared. In order to get rid of his faithful sweetheart, he schemes up a preposterous tale.

A pretty harem girl is rescued by a U. S. Navy officer. Whilst fleeing from the guards the girl takes refuge in the rooms of the notorious Rodney St. Clair, an erring Knight, who is proud of his long list of feminine conquests. But the Navy officer again comes to her rescue, and Sir Rodney is left to marry the harem's fattest woman after she puts a love potion in his drink.

A boat race rivalry erupts into comical danger.

Ben Turpin, a self-proclaimed "lady killer" finds himself in a difficult romantic predicament. Currently engaged to a woman described as a "gold-digger" (played by Madeleine Hurlock), Ben decides he must first end his relationship with his former lover, a showgirl and theater dancer named Alma Bennett.

In and out of the water, Billy makes waves at the Blue Point Beach Club.

Inbad the Sailor is a 1923 comedy short.

A man saves his lady love from Black Mike then comes wedded bliss. He hires a cook, who's brusque, domineering, and constantly smoking a cigar. Out of the blue, the couple gets a visit from his old friend, Roland Stone, bluff and portly. Roland befriends our newly-wed's wife, and this friendship deepens after the husband hires a new cook, the lovely Miss Gainsborough, who gives her boss a little too much friendly attention. That night, a prowler skulks, Miss Gainsborough faints, the newly-wed husband comes to her rescue, and she grabs him and holds on. His wife is offended and determines to leave with Roland. Is the marriage over?

Billy and Andy impersonate two ice-delivery men in a suburban town. Billy takes a fancy to a newly-wed bride and most of his loose cash is liquidated as he flirts with her. Her husband is not pleased at Billy's attentions to his new bride. There is a skating contest at the local ice-rink, and the bride, her mother and her husband are in attendance, as are Billy and Andy, the icemen.

The aging father of a farm lad thinks the boy is after dad's fiancée, so he banishes the lad. The young man heads to California where he drives a cab. Through a fare, he meets a lovely lassie. His work takes him to the beach, where he sees dad's fiancée with another man. The lad and his lassie follow the woman and try to prevent her from marrying yet another rich man. Will our farm boy and his sweetie stop injustice from happening again?

The key to baseball is the pitcher, of course. In this comedy short, the pitcher has something special. Special enough to elicit a threat to rig a game! Our hero has other ideas, though.

Two barbers, Billy and Andy head out West when one of their customers tells them that gold can literally be scooped up off the ground. Unbeknownst to them and with the shop’s manicurist in tow they run into their customer again who is a crooked gambler winning his money by questionable methods. As he rakes in the pots, an assistant pours the money down a chute which leads to a vault. Billy and Andy, in their explorations, find this vault and think they have discovered a mine. Taking some of the money, they go to the gambler's room and sit in the game. Thus, the money continues to circulate - from the mine to Billy - from Billy to the gambler - and down the chute again.

An exiled king supports his daughter and himself by serving genuine chili con carne at a rapid-service lunch counter. Word arrives that he will be crowned if he returns to Necko-Shavia and hires a taxi driver to take him there. It all turns out to be a ploy by villains to get them back to the snow-covered country. When the villains kidnap the princess and attempt a getaway in their airplane taxi driver Billy daringly negotiates a high jump on his skis and overtakes the plane in mid-air, thus affecting a thrilling rescue.

Harry Doolittle wakes up on the day he's to marry Betty Bright. He has a terrible hangover. A strange woman appears in his room saying that he married her the night before, and just then, his fiancée and her mother arrive. There's anger all around, leading to Harry's arrest. He's jailed while awaiting trial in front of Betty's father, a judge. She visits him in the clink. He escapes and disguises himself as a cabman. The police are looking for him, as are his fiancée and her mother. Will it get straightened out in time for wedding bells to ring?

A Billy Bevan slapstick comedy short.

Young Flint (Eddie Quillan), finds himself in a series of slapstick mishaps revolving around the absurdity of the bullfighting arena, featuring a climactic sequence where the bumbling protagonists must face a bull in the ring.

The Marriage Circus is a 1925 silent comedy short.

Fun develops after a feud between a railroad president and a promoter, and takes the form of a race between the pathetic train and an auto bus sponsored by the promoter. There is dirty work at the cross-roads but the villain gets his.

The on and off land escapades of a sailor as he prepares for a boxing match.

Scarem Much is a 1924 comedy short.