Robert Young, with an H.

Here is a Bit Actor that had a good start, hit some tricky obstacles, went on to make some good movies, and died young. Robert Young, that is, Robert H. Young (1917 - 1951) was known in his later career as Clifton Young.

Clifton started out billed as Bobby Young in some Our Gang comedies as one of Hal Roach's Rascals. He was known as 'Bonedust' for some reason. His first short was called Better Movies (1925) and it starred Joe Cobb and the rest.

Bobby was able to work through the change from silents to talkies while at Hal Roach Studios. His first talkie was School's Out (1930). He also saw the switch of distribution of the Our Gang films from Pathe to MGM, which happened around the same time.

The 1926 silent short called Thundering Fleas was a Hal Roach comedy starring Our Gang, but it also included Oliver Hardy, Charley Chase and James Finlayson. This was one of many films Hardy made without Stan Laurel, although they were being billed as a team by that time. Roach kept Stan and Ollie on separate contracts for almost their entire stay at his company, so he could do what he wanted with them.

Toward the end of his Our Gang career, Bobby got to work with Jackie Cooper. I always wonder how associations like that affect the future of young actors. Bobby's final short with this group was (as far as I can tell) Little Daddy in 1931. He made at least 19 Our Gang films.

Now you have Robert Young who is 14 years old in 1931. He would find out that he couldn't continue his career with that name. Robert G. Young (1907 - 1998) has just made his debut in the Charlie Chan film, The Black Camel (1931). Since Bobby was never billed as Robert, he chose to use Clifton as his stage name. It was his mother's maiden name.

The name didn't really come in to play until later. Young made several films in the 1930's, but he was uncredited in them. He went off to war, as all 24 year olds did, and started acting again in 1945. His post-war debut was in a 13 episode serial called The Master Key (1945) starring Milburn Stone (1904 - 1908). Stone, of course, would become famous as Doc Adams on "Gunsmoke." Young was in episodes 7 and 8. The serial had a great tag line, "Government agents battle a gang of Nazis who are trying to use the Orotron machine, which can turn seawater into gold."

One thing about writing a blog like mine is that I bump into films I think I would love to see. I guess I will have to keep looking, but there are so many. Clifton had a small part in one of those missed films I am putting on my list. Deception (1946) is a Bette Davis, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains Film Noir with Young as a taxi driver. Could it get any better? It even has Benson Fong, another great Bit Actor.

In the 1940's there was a series of short, instructional comedy films with a character called Joe McDoakes. They starred George O'Hanlon and totaled 63 entries that extended to 1956. Clifton Young would show up in several of them from So You Want to Play the Horses (1946) to So You Want to be an Actor (1949). O'Hanlon would go on to fame as the voice of George Jetson in "The Jetsons."

Young is now employed as a contract player at Warner Brothers. Not bad. He is working with Ann Sheridan, Robert Mitchum, Joan Crawford, Van Heflin, and other big stars. I'll stick my neck out and say that his finest role (possibly after some work in Our Gang) was as Baker in Dark Passage (1947) starring Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart.

Also in Dark Passage is Bruce Bennett, who I wrote about recently. Young and Bennett also worked together in Nora Prentiss (1947) and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948). Some great films, even though the roles for Young were small. In Treasure, he played a bum in the flop house and had no lines.

Clifton also made a few westerns. His best was most likely, Blood on the Moon (1948) starring Robert Mitchum and Barbara Bel Geddes. Another film I should look for.

The rest of Clifton's films are watchable. No blockbusters, but good films I would turn on if they were on TV. Borderline (1950) with Fred MacMurray; Bells of Coronado and Trail of Robin Hood, both 1950 Roy Rogers films; to his last film, Love Nest (1951), with Marilyn Monroe. I just saw that one, and I never saw Clifton in it.

Sadly, Clifton Young died while smoking in bed at age 33. He had quite a career in his short life, and he brought his talent to some great films, including my favorite film, Dark Passage.

Siegmund Lubin was Silent

The first "Movie Mogul" is generally accepted as being Siegmund Lubin.  He started out as an optical manufacturer and made early movie projectors.  His business was based in Philadelphia, and he eventually had studios around the country.  Oliver Hardy, a southern boy born in Georgia, worked for him in FL.

The annual Betzwood Silent Film Festival was held earlier this month at Montgomery County Community College in Bluebell, PA.  Since most of the early silent actors and actresses were little more than bit players, they certainly should be recognized here.  We saw a very good selection of silent films from 1904 to 1916.  The earlier films were little more than short visual jokes.

The first film was called A Dog Lost, Strayed or Stolen released in 1905 and made on the streets in Philadelphia.  A woman has placed an ad in the paper to find her lost dog.  About a hundred people show up at her listed meeting place to claim the reward...all with dogs!  The group of people with dogs chases the woman all around the streets, and that is basically the entire film.  It was about 5 minutes long, with no inter titles to explain what was happening.

At one point in the beginning of the film, a carriage drives in front of the camera.  The driver realizes what he did and amicably tips his hat to the camera!  Those were the days.  I don't remember the name of the lead actress, but I hope she went on to have a fulfilling movie career.

Another film was Thrilling Detective Story released in 1906.  The film starts as a woman is buying a book at Leary's Book Store.  Leary's is gone now, but it was next door to one of the Lubin buildings.  It was fun to see a book cart in the store go buy with the name prominently displayed to advertise his neighbor.  Of course it would be way to dark to actually film inside a book store, so the scene was shot on the roof of the Lubin building with a canvas backdrop painted to look like the store.

The woman starts reading what must have been a great book, and she also starts bumping into things.  She (although I suspect it as a cross dressing man who could handle all the prat falls) walks all around the city, bumping into things, getting hit by a car, and run over by a steamroller!  She eventually falls into the Schuylkill River near the Philadelphia Museum of Art and is rescued into a row boat...still reading of course!  The movie ends with her sitting in a chair with the book.  She looks into the camera and smiles.

I hope you can search out some of these early films.  They contain the seeds of what would become the films of the golden age of movies, and would evolve into today's blockbusters.  Plus, they are great fun!  You can find more about silent films at the Silent Movie Blog or tune onto Turner Classic Movies on Sunday nights at midnight when they screen silent films.

Silent Movies

Of course, movies got their start without sound.  The actors of those days would typically be folks off the street, rather than stage actors, who looked down on the cinema.  If they needed a butcher, the director went to the butcher shop.

I am fortunate to live within a short distance of the Betzwood Studio of Siegmund Lubin.  Lubin had studios in other states, Florida being famous as Oliver (Babe) Hardy's first employer in films.  Babe made about 65 films for Lubin before Hal Roach snapped him up.  Lubin's office in Philadelphia was on Arch St., but didn't have much room for location shooting.  He did most interior shots on the roof of this building, outside for light, with painted canvas backdrops.  Some of his early Philadelphia movies contain recognizable locations around the city.  He also had a studio at 20th and Lehigh, which was near Shibe Park (later Connie Mack Stadium).

The Betzwood Studio was active from 1912 to 1923, but Lubin went into bankruptcy in 1916.  One of his original storage buildings is newly renovated and is being rented as office space.  It can be seen if you drive West on Route 422, and look down from the Betzwood Bridge over the Schuylkill River.  After Lubin left, the studio was used by others, and the old Toonerville Trolly series of shorts was made there and on location in Phoenixville, PA.  IMDB credits Lubin with 1,948 films from 1897 thru 1916.

On May 1, 2010, my wife and I attended the 38th (I think) annual Betzwood Film Festival at Montgomery County Community College in Bluebell, PA.  They showed Lubin films from 1904 to 1916.  It was interesting to see how movies grew up in just 12 years, with the later films showing much more polish.

My favorite part of the festival was the organist, Don Kinnier.  He has been doing the festival for many years and he knows how to put music with each scene, to bring life to these old movies.  I spoke with Mr. Kinnier after the show and he was very nice.  That is what I like about these old movies and the folks who enjoy them...everyone is knowledgeable AND approachable. 

At the festival we saw a 1916 Lubin film, A Ready Made Maid, with Billie Reeves.  Reeves played a drunk who put on a found maid's uniform and was hired to help at a dinner party, with predictable results.  Before movies, Reeves was with the Fred Karno troupe in England, along with Charlie Chaplin and Stan Laurel.  He used to do a bit for the English music halls where he was a drunk heckler in a box near the stage.  When Reeves left Karno to go out on his own, Chaplin took the role of the drunk in that skit.  It was a part that he did so well, he became famous.

According to a source on the Internet (so it must be true!) Reeves was asked to play a drunk later in his career, and imitate Chaplin's performance.  He was indignant about that and said that he was the Original Drunk!

Check out MCCC's silent film site at:
http://faculty.mc3.edu/jeckhard/betzwood.htm
Maybe I'll see you there next year.