The Baron (1911) Online

This short comedy was a product of the Biograph Studio, but in hindsight it could be called a prototype of what would become the Keystone style. Mack Sennett, who had joined Biograph as an actor, was by 1911 in charge of his own unit there, directing short comedies under the tutelage of mentor D.W. Griffith. Two performers who appear in 'The Baron,' Fred Mace and Mabel Normand, would leave Biograph with Sennett the following year and become core members of his new company. Meanwhile, the director and his team were formulating the comic technique that would become so widely influential, as well as internationally popular.

'The Baron' is no great shakes, but it serves as a dry run of sorts for a basic premise that would be reworked many times at Keystone (and elsewhere) in the years to come: this is the tale of a lowly character who dresses up, assumes a high-born persona, and cons people into believing he's a dignitary. Biograph mainstay Dell Henderson stars as a waiter who poses as a titled aristocrat, purely for fiscal gain. In this guise, he convinces his fellow lodgers at a boarding house to loan him large sums of money. Then, setting his sights higher, he arranges a marriage with a beautiful young heiress (Mabel Normand), whose mother is completely fooled by his line of blarney. In the end, the bogus baron's scheme is foiled when one of his fellow waiters from earlier days shows up, and reveals the truth.

Henderson is very much the star of this show. In the film's funniest bit, he repeatedly fools his victims by displaying, as a title card phrases it: "My castle—my father—my trophies of honor." So saying, he indicates a generic picture of a castle, a portrait of an distinguished-looking aristocrat, and then holds out a box full of (obviously fake) medals. Amusingly, he illustrates his alleged military record by briefly "fencing" with his cane. The ploy works every time. Fred Mace is the central figure among the boarding house dupes, while Miss Normand is the unhappy would-be bride, plainly miserable at the thought of being married off to this man, whether he's a genuine baron or not.

While 'The Baron' isn't especially memorable on its own terms alone, it's more interesting when considered alongside comedies using the same theme made just few years later, such as Sennett's 1914 short Caught in a Cabaret. That film, which is still enjoyable today, features the whole Keystone ensemble at their rowdy best. It was directed by Mabel Normand herself, who also has a much meatier role in the proceedings. And playing bogus dignitary we find a newcomer to the screen, Charlie Chaplin. In only three years—three years of hard work, steady improvement, and a few exceptionally good hires—comedy producer Mack Sennett advanced from the simple archetype of 'The Baron' to prime Keystone!

Spoilers herein.

If you want to understand how you joke with yourself (which is the centerpiece of being) you need to understand how film comedy works. And for that you have to experience the inventors: Chaplin, Keaton, Arbuckle. And deeper yet, the inventor of the inventors, Sennett. He is that ghost behind the babbling ghosts in your soul.

This is one of Sennett's apprentice films from the period where he was directing... one every week. They aren't remembered fondly. This is the first I've seen from this period as they are hard to find, and he didn't write it.

Nonetheless, there are several comic twists in this seven minute story, twisted cleanly. No sign yet of the frantic.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

Dell Henderson pretends to be a foreign Count on using that as an edge, talks the guardians of heiress Mabel Normand into having her marry him.... assuming he can borrow enough money from from the other folks at his boarding house for the honeymoon.

It's a story that's not particularly original to Mack Sennett's comedy unit at Biograph, and it's one that he would carry with him when he left and pass it on -- Chaplin would use the gimmick as the basis of THE COUNT, for example.

At a half reel, there isn't much elaboration, nor was there much in the way of gags for Sennett in this period, not for a half-reel comedy. People look fairly normal, although Mabel does have an amusingly bilious expression on her face at the prospect of the wedding vows.