11,878 stories by "Trav S.D."
Gustavus Katterfelto (ca. 1743-1799) was a species of professional that no longer exists — part quack physician, part magician, part legitimate scientific lecturer. In addition, he imp…
Comus was the ancient Greek God of revels, festivity and chaos, the son and cup-bearer to Dionysus. From the same etymological root we derive the word for comedy. A fiiting stage name …
This is one in a series of posts we are producing in connection with our new book Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, available from Bear Manor Media…
The Balasic Family were a troupe of performing acrobats originally from Croatia, whose contributions to the variety stage spanned three generations, from the 1860s through the 1930s. The …
Singer/dancer Frank Carter (1888-1920) is sadly better known for his death than his life. The young performer met Marilyn Miller when they performed together in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1918.…
Joseph Pinetti (1750-1800) was the principal figure in European magic during the second half of the eighteenth century. At the time, most conjurers were sleight-of-hand men who worked out…
The friggin’ blog ate 3/4 of my post as a I published it a few minutes ago. Here it is in its entirety. I walked into work and back again today, an hour plus each way — and are m…
Yesterday morning, stir crazy from having been cooped up in the apartment a couple of days, with no subways running and having some stuff to check on at work, I made the trek from my Park Sl…
This is one in a series of posts we are producing in connection with our new book Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, available from Bear Manor Media…
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #71: Fanny Brice (for her whole story go here). Known best as a comedienne, ironically the song she was most associated with is a tear-jerker. Her…
The elder Dick Henderson (1891-1958) was a British music hall comedian who first came over to play American vaudeville in 1924 and also made several Vitaphone shorts. He is remembered as …
Edward Franklin Sharpless (1872-1937), a native of Marion OH, changed his named to Ed Reynard, a.k.a. The Great Reynard, and became in the words of Joe Laurie Jr. a “pioneer” vau…
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #69, Jack Pearl, a.k.a Baron Munchausen (for more on him go here). Here’s a clip from his hilarious 1933 film Meet the Baron: To find out mo…
Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #70, Walter C. Kelly, “The Virginia Judge” (for more biographical details go here). Now for your delectation, a sampling of one of …
After the last iteration of P.T. Barnum’s American Museum burned to the ground in 1868, the showman did the unthinkable; he retired. In actuality he was just temporarily down. Whil…
This is one in a series of posts we are producing in connection with our new book Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, available from Bear Manor Media…
Edward V. Darling (1891-1951) was one of the most powerful men in big time vaudeville. He began working for Edward Albee as secretary in 1905; within four years he was chief booker for the e…
Today is the birthday of Dylan Thomas (1914-1953), my favorite poet when I was about 20. This is far from his best poem, but I like the contrary spirit of it, and I note that it was on…
Today is the birthday of John Cleese (b. 1939). I made up for a great defficiency in my education a few months ago by watching Fawlty Towers in its entirety. I won’t be adding anything…
Just heard that Candy Johnson passed away. The Countess and I first became aware of her when we were paying attention to beach party movies for our reading of Beach Blanket Bluebeard. She…
I can’t think of a better place on earth to watch these horror classics than the atmospheric old Loew’s Jersey, in Journal Square (Jersey City). for full details go to www.loewsj…
Somehow he went from being the most beautiful child in the world, to this man. Did he spit in the face of a witch? Today is the birthday of Star of Vaudeville #380: Jackie Coogan (see …
Alright…this is the second time WordPress has eaten part of one of my reviews somewhere in the draft stage. I am attempting to recreate my brilliant post of 5am this morning from memor…
Baby Peggy (Peggy-Jean Montgomery, born this day in 1918) began her career as a child star in silent movies at the age of three (her father had been a stunt man and stand-in for Tom Mix). Sh…
