Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

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Rob Farr
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Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Rob Farr » Thu Jun 18, 2015 1:37 pm

Slate's coverage of the Burkow collection yielding the second reel of Battle of the Century was written by Matthew Dessem, and he links to his excellent career article about Clyde Bruckman. It was published last year by The Dissolve and Dessem is working on a book-length version that is scheduled to come out in August. Rather than repeating the same old shopworn stories, Dessem went back to the primary source documents and explodes many Bruckman myths. Well worth reading.
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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Richard M Roberts » Thu Jun 18, 2015 7:35 pm

The articles a fair effort, but still full of holes and nearly as successful at belittling Bruckman's accomplishments as the Wikipedia article. Bruckman was a MAJOR Comedy Writer and Gagman of the 1920's, and the simple fact that he was being paid as well as he was in the 1920's and still being used as much as he was in the 1930's and early 40's when his drinking had become problematic attests to this. In the 20's he had three major comedians, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, and Monty Banks vying for his services, and though Harold Lloyd loved to downplay his writng and production staff's contributions, he had the largest writing staff and paid more for them than any other silent comedian, he wasn't just buying people to stand around while he did everything.

Sam Gill once told me a great story about a time when he was visiting Fred Newmeyer and going through his collection of stills and they came across a picture of Harold Lloyd's writing and production staff, Newmeyer pointed at the group in the picture and said"THAT'S Harold Lloyd".

And Harold Lloyd wasn't in the picture.


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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Gary Johnson » Sat Jun 20, 2015 2:39 am

Lloyd didn't seem to hold his writing and production staff in the same regard as Keaton did. At times Lloyd behaved like he didn't know any of them by name. Maybe he did in the Twenties when he worked side-by-side with them everyday, but as the years passed by his stories always sounded like "....a former gag writer of mine" or "...a guy who once directed for me".

It always came across as a bit impersonal. Very Chaplin-like. It never surprised me that he eventually threw Bruckman under the bus.

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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Richard M Roberts » Sat Jun 20, 2015 4:12 am

Gary Johnson wrote:Lloyd didn't seem to hold his writing and production staff in the same regard as Keaton did. At times Lloyd behaved like he didn't know any of them by name. Maybe he did in the Twenties when he worked side-by-side with them everyday, but as the years passed by his stories always sounded like "....a former gag writer of mine" or "...a guy who once directed for me".

It always came across as a bit impersonal. Very Chaplin-like. It never surprised me that he eventually threw Bruckman under the bus.



Well, Lloyd held them in very high esteem in he 1920's when he was stealing them away from other comedians, paying them better, then holding them exclusive or only renting them out to comics he felt were not a threat. I always thought it was interesting that Keaton seemed to talk a bit grudgingly about Lloyd in interviews (especially when referring to the number of writers Lloyd used) and that was because in 1925, Lloyd pilfered a number of Keatons writers, including Bruckman. This also makes obvious the nonsensical concept that these writers didn;t contribute anything to these so-called "auteurs" films.

Bruckman's actual specialty was not only gag-writing, but tying gags into both plot and characterization. I remember him described in someones interview (another comedy writer, don't remember who at the moment, don't have access to my files right now, I'm in Los Angeles) who described Bruckman as the one who took notes or sat at the typewriter during the gag sessions and took everything down, then came up with ways to work gags into the plot structure or make them work for a specific comic's character.

BTW, that quote of Keatons about never having a script to his films should also be taken with a grain of salt, so many of the comedians tried to paint this picture of free wheeling picturemaking that is just nonsense, you simply can't coordinate a film, especially one like Keatons with as complicated mechanical gags requiring major building and preparation without some sort of plot construction written down. In fact, didn't a script for THE GENERAL turn up a few years ago?

I will say that it's most likely Harold Lloyd didn't think of Bruckman at all when he filed the Universal lawsuit, certainly not with any malice. Like the good, rich republican that he was, I'm sure that his only concern was the protection of what he perceived as his property without any concern at all over what consequences his actions might have on other peoples lives.


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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Paul E. Gierucki » Sun Jun 21, 2015 9:44 am

A complete script for THE GENERAL turned up at auction several years ago and is now in the hands of The International Buster Keaton Society. Interestingly, and right on topic, that script came from the estate of Clyde Bruckman.

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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Steve Rydzewski » Sun Jun 21, 2015 10:54 am

I remember a Bruckman memorabilia auction only one year ago where Keaton's "The General" script was included, also Three Stooges scripts, Abbott & Costello TV scripts, and more went up for sale and sold. The General script alone sold for over four-thousand, actually probably over five-thousand with taxes, fees, etc tacked on.

Was the Keaton Society forced to sell, Paul, or was this the one and only auction one year ago?

– SteveR

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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Paul E. Gierucki » Tue Jun 23, 2015 12:10 am

I learned that the Bruckman estate was up for sale,
discovered that an original script for THE GENERAL
was available, so I contacted our friends at The
International Buster Keaton Society with the information
and a "you absolutely must have this -- regardless of
the cost" message. The powers that be agreed and
made the purchase happen. The script turned out to
be much more than originally anticipated, it was loaded
with Buster Keaton's personal handwritten notations
and directions. The script will eventually be combined
with a huge collection of unpublished photographs (also
recently discovered) and made available as part of a
new book being written about the film. As always, I
will post details here as they become available.

-- Paul E. Gierucki

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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Richard M Roberts » Wed Jun 24, 2015 9:44 am

You know, that story about Bruckman only shooting the retakes on FATAL GLASS OF BEER is also untrue. Bruckman shot all of that short, including the retakes, from 11/22/1932 to 11/28/1932, and was also collaborating with Fields on the script for TOO MANY HIGHBALLS, which Bruckman directed after Fields was replaced with Lloyd Hamilton due to his refusal to do retakes on FATAL GLASS OF BEER. This is why Bruckman was hired to work on THE MAN ON THE FLYING TRAPEZE, which is a remake of TOO MANY HIGHBALLS.


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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Ed Watz » Thu Jun 25, 2015 9:34 am

Buster Keaton was very much a gentleman regarding his public opinions of Harold Lloyd and Charlie Chaplin, so it may raise a few eyebrows when some readers see his off-the-record comments about these two contemporaries, quoted by Harold Goodwin and Bill Cox, which will appear in the book Bill Cassara and I are currently working on ("Buster Keaton in The Talkies: Laughter Louder Than Words"). Buster's remarks don't come across as the grumblings of an old man; they illustrate how deeply he understood comedy character, even the characters created by his rivals, and where he felt they both "stooped to get a laugh." Anyhow, it's all going to be in the book.
"Of course he smiled -- just like you and me." -- Harold Goodwin, on Buster Keaton (1976)

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Re: Great Clyde Bruckman Article and Forthcoming Book

Postby Richard M Roberts » Thu Jun 25, 2015 12:22 pm

Ed Watz wrote:Buster Keaton was very much a gentleman regarding his public opinions of Harold Lloyd and Charlie Chaplin, so it may raise a few eyebrows when some readers see his off-the-record comments about these two contemporaries, quoted by Harold Goodwin and Bill Cox, which will appear in the book Bill Cassara and I are currently working on ("Buster Keaton in The Talkies: Laughter Louder Than Words"). Buster's remarks don't come across as the grumblings of an old man; they illustrate how deeply he understood comedy character, even the characters created by his rivals, and where he felt they both "stooped to get a laugh." Anyhow, it's all going to be in the book.



Even some of Busters on-record comments about Lloyd were not so-particularly veiled. Keaton definitely resented Lloyd's pilfering of his writing staff, including Bruckman, who did not "free-lance" as tha article says on THE FRESHMAN, he, in fact, remained on Lloyd'a payroll for the next year and a half, and Lloyd was only willing to loan Bruckman out to lesser-threat comedians like Monty Banks, but Bruckman did not work on either GO WEST, or BATTLING BUTLER. Then Lloyd stole Keaton's replacement for Bruckman: Lex Neal, in 1927, who then worked on THE KID BROTHER and SPEEDY.


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