Complete credited cast: | |||
Charles Chaplin | ... | Charlie | |
Charley Chase | ... | Nephew (as Charles Parrot) | |
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Peggy Page | ... | Nephew's Girlfriend (as Miss Page) |
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Jess Dandy | ... | Invalid Uncle |
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Cecile Arnold | ... | Girl with Eggs |
Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle | ... | Bartender Smoking Cigar |
Charlie meets a couple and agrees to care for the man's crippled uncle. After the couple breaks up the man's new girl drops some eggs which Charlie slips on while trying to control the wheelchair. Charlie sets up the uncle near another wheelchair on a jetty, from which he lifts a beggar's cup and "invalid" sign. These he places with the uncle, and money begins to roll in. Charlie takes the money and buys himself a drink. Returning, he gets to know the abandoned young woman. After pushing the uncle and his chair into the drink and battling the beggar and two policemen (one of whom arrests the uncle), Charlie beats up his rival and gets the girl. Written by Ed Stephan <stephan@cc.wwu.edu>
I saw this Charlie Chaplin short under the title THE GOOD FOR NOTHING. It's very similar in tone to IN THE PARK, consisting of Chaplin and a few others goofing around in the great outdoors, although the setting this time around is a pier. I didn't like it as much as IN THE PARK, as the gag rate isn't as consistent, and much of the humour is lowbrow and repetitive.
Chaplin plays an idler who is tasked with looking after an invalid by fellow comedian Charley Chase. The guy is in a wheelchair so all manner of pain-focused gags arise from that situation. There are some very funny bits here, especially those involving the wheelchair being pushed around, although Chaplin doesn't seem quite on form and he has little of those character quirks I've seen elsewhere. Watch out for Fatty Arbuckle's cameo as the exasperated bartender.