Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett [Import] [Paperback]

Simon Louvish (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Faber and Faber; New Ed edition (October 6, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0571226477
• ISBN-13: 978-0571226474
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,295,370 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing Book on a Fascinating Subject, April 2, 2004

By 

Tom Moran (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett (Hardcover)

I'm a big fan of not only silent films in general but silent comedy in particular, so you would think that I'd be the natural audience for Simon Louvish's new book on Mack Sennett, D.W. Griffith's protégé and the man behind the Keystone Studio, which produced (or at least discovered) such comic geniuses as Charlie Chaplin and Roscoe Arbuckle. Well, you'd be right: I am the natural audience for "Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett." So why was I so disappointed?

It has some new information on the life of the Canadian-born producer and his life and times, but the book is so vilely written that I found it a chore to read. It almost feels like Louvish, who wrote a far better book on the Marx Brothers and other books on famous comedians that I have not read, fell under the stylistic influence of Gene Fowler, a previous Sennett biographer and the maudlin biographer of John Barrymore, whose prose style is replete with every sappy literary cliché known to man (memorably described by Edmund Wilson: "...the style couldn't be more journalistic in a flowery, old-fashioned way... [it] has no structure and no harmonics. It is something that is exhaled like breath or exuded like perspiration."). If you doubt my word and decide to read the book anyway, try and count the number of times Louvish uses the archaic word "quoth" in a sentence.

So I'm torn about this book. There simply aren't enough good books about this period, and there is some new information to be gleaned from Louvish's pages (although I found myself disagreeing with some, but not all, of his conclusions). But its wretched prose style, if you have any feeling at all for the English language, will set your teeth on edge. You might not care if you're a real fan of early silent comedy, and if that's the case go ahead and read it. But don't say I didn't warn you.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Much better than reported., July 16, 2005

By 

Nancy Beiman "Northernexpress" (Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett (Hardcover)

This book is a lot better than the previous reviewers would have me believe. Louvish had access to the Mack Sennett Papers at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, something that previous writers like Walter Kerr and Kalton Lahue did not.

Of course, Sennett did not include his private papers in the collection so little is known of his private life--which he apparently kept private. Louvish posts hypotheses based on fact and states that these are Not Proven; he does NOT claim that Sennett was gay. Of course he is putting a modern gloss on the behaviour of people from nearly a century ago. People really did behave, and talk, differently then.

Some of his material, particularly new material about Mabel Normand, is saddening and worthy of note.

This is also the only book to tell the very moving story of Ben Turpin and his terminally ill wife, whom he supported until her death.

There are some erroneous statements in the book that could have been better edited; Chaplin toured the USA in a production called MUMMING BIRDS, not EARLY BIRDS; Buster Keaton was drafted in WWI, not enlisted; and Roscoe Arbuckle's THAT MINSTREL MAN was made for Keystone, not 'just as he was about to join Keystone.'

I do recommend that you consider this book. There is a lot of good material in it that is of interest to the silent historian.

And I've not read the word 'quoth' once.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars For those interested in comedy film history, April 15, 2004

By 

James L. Neibaur - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Keystone: The Life and Clowns of Mack Sennett (Hardcover)

As comedy is central to the development of cinema, a book on Mack Sennett is essential. Sennett was a movie pioneer who produced some of the earliest slapstick comedies. The films spawned such important comedians as Charlie Chaplin, Roscoe Arbuckle, Mabel Normand, and Harry Langdon. They were also an early, albeit comparatively brief, training ground for the likes of Harold Lloyd and Charley Chase. Director Frank Capra enjoyed some of his early success writing and co-writing Sennett productions. Louvish examines Sennett the man and tells the story of Mack's work from his early days with D.W. Griffith to his own productions beginning in the early teens and lasting into the 1930s and the talking picture revolution. Even for comedy film buffs who have read a great deal about this genre, Louvish offers a lot of interesting information that does not appear in other sources. There have been few truly good books on Mack Sennett and his work. This one is quite good. Recommended.