Topic: The Grand Hooter (1937) - Charley Chase

[Paul Pain]

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028949

We could wax poetic all day about Charley Chase, but we have 20+ weeks to do so.  This short was later remade with Shemp Howard as OPEN SEASON FOR SAPS.

OPEN SEASON FOR SAPS review: https://moronika.com/forums/index.php/topic,5737.0.html

This short is better than the remake in every way.  The reason is that Charley Chase is the best man for a Charley Chase short.  He was just about the only comedian who came into the Columbia Shorts Department with an established persona and had the script writers cater to it.  Charley Chase works well as the problematic husband who gets himself into a domestic farce.

The chemistry with the cast works well as a result because their is a top-notch actor in his ideal element.  Interesting, the "Latin" couple of "Rosita" and "Ricardo" are played by a Sicilian and a Jew, respectively.  They handle it well though.  We're getting much better casts than we got with El Brendel.  Even Bud Jamison is here and gets to kick Lynton Brent in the can.

The plot is a bit weak, although the ending scene is on a familiar set in Columbia shorts!  The commonality of the lodge members just seems a bit strange, and, SPOILER ALERT, Ricardo being a Hooter as well is a bit of a dud.

The next few months will be fun.

9/10

[metaldams]

Pretty much the same thoughts about this one as OPEN SEASON FOR SAPS.  I still say THE GRAND HOOTER is slightly better because yes, Chase is more believable in this role.  A great example is him singing and playing guitar to the other woman is much more appropriate than Christine singing to Shemp and Shemp dancing around like a clown.  Not that I mind Shemp dancing around like a clown, but it just doesn’t work in this situation,

Then there’s the whole drag thing.  In both cases, is there anything remotely feminine about either Chase or Shemp to make one believe if they put on women’s clothes they’re all of the sudden going to be attractive to men?  With very few exceptions, drag comedy has never done it for me and this is a big reason why.  I also tend to get bored with the chases after a while in these bedroom farce comic dramas, just very one note.

Yeah, not exactly a good start to the Chase series at Columbia.  He’s done much better before and will do better after.  At least the title is kind of funny if you picture Al Bundy saying it.

[metaldams]

....and yes, correct.  The last shot uses the balcony set from 3 DUMB CLUCKS.  I imagine shot around the same time.

[Paul Pain]

While normally long domestic chases normally bore me as well, I liked this one.  There were some unique moments, like Charley hiding above shower curtain rod, the room service man flipping 180 and the platter staying intact, and the moment when Charley opens the door into that poor bystander, who handles the scene perfectly.

[Paul Pain]

....and yes, correct.  The last shot uses the balcony set from 3 DUMB CLUCKS.  I imagine shot around the same time.

Indeed.  3 DUMB CLUCKS was filmed Feb. 1 to Feb. 5 in 1937, and THE GRAND HOOTER was filmed Feb. 18 to Feb. 22 of the same year.

[metaldams]

While normally long domestic chases normally bore me as well, I liked this one.  There were some unique moments, like Charley hiding above shower curtain rod, the room service man flipping 180 and the platter staying intact, and the moment when Charley opens the door into that poor bystander, who handles the scene perfectly.

I made sure to watch this back to back with the Shemp version and yeah, Chase hiding on top of the shower curtain was exclusive to that and a cool moment, agreed.  Those other moments are good too.  I’ve seen worse shorts by far and Chase (and Shemp) make this more tolerable than if it were some lesser comedian - it’s just this type of comedy rarely does it for me.  Hey, for people who like this kind of thing, one can do much worse.

Gotta say, Peggy Stratford is one of those Columbia players that make me wonder why she never worked with The Three Stooges.

[metaldams]

Indeed.  3 DUMB CLUCKS was filmed Feb. 1 to Feb. 5 in 1937, and THE GRAND HOOTER was filmed Feb. 18 to Feb. 22 of the same year.

Where did you get the filming dates?

....for the Chase short, I mean.

[Paul Pain]

Where did you get the filming dates?

....for the Chase short, I mean.

I did a Google search and found a snippet from a book on Chase's sound shorts, and it included production dates in the write-up.

[Umbrella Sam]

Overall, this was a decent short. I like the gag near the beginning where Chase starts marching while the music is playing, and I do like most of the chase towards the end, especially when Peggy Stratford is chopping down the pole Chase is stuck at the top of. Chase’s song is entertaining as well. Normally I’m not a huge fan of drag comedy and I don’t exactly consider this to be a particularly good use of it either, but I did think it was kind of clever how they had to have him try and hide his mustache to avoid giving himself away.

The bad part, like Paul says, is that the plot is pretty weak. I wouldn’t mind so much except they devote so much time to setting it up and it diverts into chaos that is only resolved through a running gag that I don’t find to be all that funny. Yeah, I get that it is meant to get the wife angry enough to the point that she breaks and chases him, and I do think the payoff is funny. But it takes so long to set up that the whole middle of the film, with the exception of Chase’s song, really drags. Yeah, there are a few gags in there, but none that left an impression on me.

To its credit, this does at least seem like the type of short Chase might have done at Roach, which does make it stand out from most of Columbia’s non-Stooges output.

7 out of 10