How Mabel Normand filmed her rooftop stunt in Mickey

[John Bengtson]

Read how Mabel Normand cleverly staged a rooftop stunt for her 1918 feature Mickey on a classic Bunker Hill building years before Harold Lloyd filmed his own stunts for Safety Last.



https://silentlocations.wordpress.com/2016/03/07/how-mabel-normand-filmed-her-safety-last-moment-before-harold-lloyd-did-2/

Cheers, John

[Richard M Roberts]

MICKEY was shot all over the place, the racetrack scenes were shot in Phoenix, Arizona at the old Fairgrounds grandstand.


RICHARD M ROBERTS

[John Bengtson]

MICKEY was shot all over the place, the racetrack scenes were shot in Phoenix, Arizona at the old Fairgrounds grandstand.


RICHARD M ROBERTS

Thanks Richard - I didn't know they filmed out of state. Do you know why they filmed in Arizona? I have read that the mountain lake scenes were filmed near LA at Big Bear.

They filmed ground level tracking shots of the race at the equestrian track at Exposition Park in Los Angeles. You can see the dome of the extant Los Angeles Natural History Museum, adjacent to the park, in this shot. Other Expo park buildings appear too.

Mickey 73 Exposition Park by SilentEchoes57, on Flickr

[Richard M Roberts]

MICKEY was started on the East Coast, and went through lots of footage and directors (inclusing James Young, J. Farrell McDonald, and Arvid Gillstrom before F. Richard Jones took over and finished it), Production lasted nearly a year with shooting commencing from Summer of 1916 to Spring of 1917, with most of the later work and shooting done in Hollywood. In November, 1916, the MICKEY crew were in Phoenix reshooting the race track sequence at the old Phoenix Fairgrounds grandstand and trotting track, but it is most likely they did more pick-up shots in Los Angeles later on. MIles of footage were shot, re-shot, and discarded on this picture, which started life under the working title PAT, and was changed to MICKEY sometime during the debacle.

There's coverage of the shooting of MICKEY in the old Arizona Republican newspaper.


RICHARD M ROBERTS

[John Bengtson]

MICKEY was started on the East Coast, and went through lots of footage and directors (inclusing James Young, J. Farrell McDonald, and Arvid Gillstrom before F. Richard Jones took over and finished it), Production lasted nearly a year with shooting commencing from Summer of 1916 to Spring of 1917, with most of the later work and shooting done in Hollywood. In November, 1916, the MICKEY crew were in Phoenix reshooting the race track sequence at the old Phoenix Fairgrounds grandstand and trotting track, but it is most likely they did more pick-up shots in Los Angeles later on. MIles of footage were shot, re-shot, and discarded on this picture, which started life under the working title PAT, and was changed to MICKEY sometime during the debacle.

There's coverage of the shooting of MICKEY in the old Arizona Republican newspaper.


RICHARD M ROBERTS

Thank you so much Richard - this is all very interesting. This means that Mabel filmed her rooftop stunt well before Harold Lloyd started filming stunt climbing comedies in 1919.

Cheers, John

[Richard M Roberts]

MICKEY was started on the East Coast, and went through lots of footage and directors (inclusing James Young, J. Farrell McDonald, and Arvid Gillstrom before F. Richard Jones took over and finished it), Production lasted nearly a year with shooting commencing from Summer of 1916 to Spring of 1917, with most of the later work and shooting done in Hollywood. In November, 1916, the MICKEY crew were in Phoenix reshooting the race track sequence at the old Phoenix Fairgrounds grandstand and trotting track, but it is most likely they did more pick-up shots in Los Angeles later on. MIles of footage were shot, re-shot, and discarded on this picture, which started life under the working title PAT, and was changed to MICKEY sometime during the debacle.

There's coverage of the shooting of MICKEY in the old Arizona Republican newspaper.


RICHARD M ROBERTS

Thank you so much Richard - this is all very interesting. This means that Mabel filmed her rooftop stunt well before Harold Lloyd started filming stunt climbing comedies in 1919.

Cheers, John

No one versed to any degree in Silent Comedy is going to give Harold Lloyd credit for inventing the building climbing comedy, you can start with Larry Semon’s DUNCES AND DANGER, which Vitagraph released August 5, 1918, and keep moving backward from there through Keystone and L-KO comedies that have similar gags. Give me time to think about it, and I think we could find one earlier then MICKEY.

RICHARD M ROBERTS