The Fatal Mallet

Today is the anniversary of the release date of the Keystone short The Fatal Mallet. 

In this outdoor comedy, no less than three self-styled suitors vie for Mabel Normand’s attentions: Mack Sennett, Charlie Chaplin, and Mack Swain. To get each other out of the way, they throw bricks at one another, hit each other with the titular mallet, and lock one another in a nearby barn. Then a fourth nuisance steps in, a sexually advanced youngster played by Gordon Griffith. In the end, the requisite dunkings in the duck pond.

For more on comedy film history including Charlie Chaplin comedies like The Fatal Mallet please check out my new book: Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, just released by Bear Manor Media, also available from amazon.com etc etc etc