This is, without a doubt, one of the worst books I've read in recent memory. It reads like a painfully long book report on Buster Keaton written by a junior high school student: short, awkward, repetitive sentences chock full of misspellings, grammatical errors, overused superlatives, and excessive generalizations. As if that weren't enough to dissaude anyone from trying to read his work, the author included a plethora of factual errors as well. I'm ashamed our public library actually carries a book this bad, but at least I didn't waste any money on it.

One question kept running through my mind as I read this book (or, rather, read the first half before I threw the thing out)....Did this author do any actual research for his information??? I noticed many glaring contradictions or falsehoods troughout the book, but chalked these up to the possibility of differing reports from interviewees. But, as soon as I read that DANNY KAYE starred in The Buster Keaton Story (actually starred Donald O'Connor), I promptly recycled the book and went in search of something (ANYTHING) better that may have been written about the greatest film comic of ANY time. Mr. Edwards, please stick to criticizing film....don't actually WRITE about it!

This embarrassing book has so many factual errors it is difficult to know where to start pointing them out. One example will suffice: the author lists Danny Kaye AND Donald O'Connor as playing the lead in the biopic THE BUSTER KEATON STORY. Interesting sounding 'facts' abound. No proof is ever offered that these events, totally unknown to other Keaton biographers, ever occurred. I have to give them the same credence I did the Kaye/O'Connor credit. And how dare he repeat the old saws about the Fatty Arbuckle scandal? This author's main source of research appears to have been HOLLYWOOD BABYLON. This might have made good fiction if the writing style were not so excruciatingly bad. Avoid like the plague.

_The Theatre and Cinema of Buster Keaton_ makes some interesting points -- in particular, the ways in which Keaton was able to take what he learned on the Vaudeville stage and integrate it to astonishing effect in his films. There's also a fairly interesting discussion of his affinities with the Surrealists -- an example given is the underwater scene in "The Navigator," where Buster is shown using lobster claws to cut a wire, and then getting into a sword fight with a swordfish using another swordfish as his weapon.

But overall, the writing was ponderous, and the book seemed more like the citation-filled musings of an undergraduate than a mature, cutting-edge scholarly discussion. The book might be more bearable if the author didn't beat us over the head with the same arguments.

Knopf sees three aspects of classic Keaton analysis:

1. Classical H'wood narrative branch, as represented by Moews, Bordwell and most film historians. 2. Vaudeville entertainer approach. What Knopf means by this is the emphasis of gags as gags instead of narrative emphasis as represented by branch #1.

Branches #1 and #2 follow the route trod by many a film comedy theorist, and consist of the [to them] all-important narrative? Knopf recognizes a continuum in film comedy theory from 'gags/performance integrate with narrative' to 'gags/performance have no relation whatsoever to narrative'.

The gag/narrative dichotomy seems 'cutting edge' because, presumably, gags over narrative represents a transgression, and any transgression is sexy to academic theorists. The gag comedian who 'subverts' narrative is seen as rebelling against the status quo, and is, in the academic's scheme of things, more worthy of appreciation than the comedian who, in the academic's opinion, is more faithful to narrative tradition. Whether the high cultural referent is the Surrealists or Brecht or Beckett, the idea is that 'rebel' comedians are more in tune with the celestial spheres of high art than those who are perceived as hugging the status quo narrative line.

The third branch of Surrealist muse. The main importance of branch # 3, as far as I can tell, is that it allows Knopf to play the 'famous artists and intellectuals my guy influenced or who adored my guy' game, which is as inexhaustible a game as the 'who stole what gag from whom?' game, and about as instructive in terms of appreciating the art of film comedy. In the 'Keaton and the Surrealists' chapter, Knopf gets to reel off the actual, probable and possible influences Keaton had on the Surrealists. It's a fun game if you're in the mood. The all-time champ among comedians in the 'famous artists who were influenced by my guy/who adored my guy', game, by the way, is Chaplin. Hands down.

Well, what is Knopf's conception of these three branches, the classical narrative, the vaudeville entertainer, the surrealist muse?

Knopf doesn't have much to say about the classical narrative approach. He merely mentions in passing that Keaton is often cited as a superb exemplar of classical narrative filmmaking. Actually, most successful Hollywood filmmakers are superb exemplars of classical narrative filmmaking. That's why it's called classical narrative filmmaking.

The vaudeville entertainer approach seems to be the main thrust of the book. Knopf appears, unwittingly, to confuse two mutually film comedy to vaudeville roots, particularly the roots of Keaton's own performing family; and the 'gags over narrative' approach most closely associated with Prof. Henry Jenkins at MIT, which emphasizes how non-linear gags/spectacle disrupt traditional narrative. These analyses are mutually exclusive because the historical approach is a 'bottom up' approach, which demands a scrupulous study of early film comedy and late 19th century/turn of the century stage traditions; and the 'gags over narrative' approach is a 'top down' approach which ignores actual history, and focuses instead on the theorist's theories about narrative [boo, hiss] v. non-linear gags [hooray]. Knopf, who leans toward high theory, as his favourable citations of Jenkins and other academic comedy theorists suggest, does a less-than-half-assed job on the historical side of things. He makes an effort, anyway, which is more than can be said of most film comedy theorists.

Knopf rounds out his book with Keaton's influence on the New Vaudeville and Performance Art, which is one more tack at 'artists my guy influenced or who adored my guy'. Another fun game. Theatrical pantomimist/comedian Bill Irwin is mentioned frequently. Irwin, by the way, wears, as a stage prop, round, black-framed glasses. Which suggests the influence of another prominent silent comedian. But Knopf doesn't bother mentioning this. It gets in the way of how much Irwin admires/pays homage to Keaton.

As with most Keaton admirers, Knopf mentions Arbuckle Arbuckle didn't have much influence on Keaton's work. Keaton only made nearly 20 short-reelers with Arbuckle.

Clyde Bruckman, like Eddie Cline, worked with Buster from the short-reel days. Bruckman is cited for his quote, in Rudi Blesch's book on Keaton, that Keaton was responsible for virtually all the gags and filmmaking on his films. This quote is treated as dogma by Keaton admirers. You wonder what Cline, Havez, Mitchell, St. Clair, Lex Neal and others [including, after his scandal, Arbuckle] were doing on Joe Schenck's payroll ~ Joe Schenck produced the Keaton solo shorts and features ~ if they were contributing 10% to the production. Perhaps they were all agents instead of talented gagwriters and scenarists. Knopf, like most film comedy theorists, has absolutely no use for the likes of Cline, Bruckman, etc. Although Knopf does mention that Elgin Lessley, Keaton's supremely talented cameraman, suggested the 'Keaton enters a film in a dream' bit in SHERLOCK, JR., which only happens to be the most admired sequence in all of Keaton. And that Lessley was critical to the conception and filming of the 'multiple Keatons' bit in 'The Playhouse', which is one of the most admired sequences in Keaton's short films. And Clyde Bruckman co-directed THE GENERAL, one of the most admired films in the Keaton canon. narrative filmmaker, Keaton as vaudeville entertainer, Keaton as Surrealist muse? Who cares, as long as it's Keaton? Keaton, the brand preferred by four out of five film comedy theorists. Maybe it's time for academic comedy theorists to lay off Keaton for a while. It's been a long, long time since they've championed anyone else.

Perhaps they should write exhaustively about someone else for a change. Jerry Lewis, maybe.

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Rick Levinson

Though intellectually intriguing, The Theatre and Cinema of Buster Keaton is anything but a dry read. Knopf presents Keaton's films in a context not previously considered in film history and he does so in a manner both intelligent and engaging. The two great assets of Knopf's thesis are his comparison between Keaton's films and his earlier work in vaudeville theatre and the connection between Keaton's comic gags and the ideals of the surrealist filmmakers. Knopf's detailed and colorful history into Keaton's vaudeville deepens one's appreciation for Keaton's great gags by suggesting the exaggeration made from the limits of the stage to the freedom of film. Knopf's inquiry into the appropriation by the surrealists suggests a new vision of Keaton's films. Given this new context Keaton's films surpass their conventional genre of Hollywood humor, but rather are reflective of an American (albeit unwitting) avant-garde. Not only are the ideas in this text compelling and well documented, but they are presented in a writing style which is engaging for both the serious film scholar and the fan of Keaton humor. This investigation into Keaton's humor only serves to embellish the effect of his gags and comic brilliance. This analysis only elevates its subject.

There's a factual mistake on nearly every page of this book. Dardis is obsessed with Keaton's drinking, spending some 80 pages of the book on this subject, while cutting the last 25 years of Keaton's life to a mere 20 pages.
In short, this Dardis book is uniformed, inaccurate, unbalanced, and unhinged. However, despite all this, the Dardis bio is still somethat superior on the Marion Meade book, which is even worse. A solid Keaton bio has yet to be written.

Don't bother to read this book. It overlooks Buster's artistry, and is strangely obsessed with the finances of each film. A much better book on Keaton is the one by Rudi Blesh, which is unfortunately unavailable now.

I am an unabashed fan of Buster Keaton, believing his to be the pinnacle of physical humor on film in the 20th century. This book balanced the many aspects of a complicated and brilliant man who spent only one day in a schoolroom. The final section is written very sensitively, and has some great photos.

Read the other one star review. It was being kind

Please, please, please avoid this book. If it was possible to give it NO stars, I would have done so. It is the most turgid academic bilge I have read in years. Why is there so much drivel written about Keaton? You are better off searching out David Robinson's KEATON, the best critial analysis of his films. Check this out on OOP booksearches instead; it probably costs the same as this wretched book and it is at least worth it.

I don't think this book is bad at all! It has a lot of interesting things to say about Sherlock, Jr. I really think the past two reviewers were way too harsh!