I actually kind of like this one, although I do see your points. As far as story goes, this is all over the place and there definitely are things that don’t make sense (why doesn’t the father-in-law just confront Chase’s valet?). Still, I do have to admit that I did enjoy a lot of the gags. I really liked Chase’s bear disguise when attempting to sneak past Murray (although it’s never really clear why he even has to sneak past him). I also enjoyed Chase’s attempts to act like a French chef; he does get pretty over-the-top with it, and it is a lot of fun, even if the kitchen gags aren’t done as well as the Stooges did it. The kleptomaniac angle is used a lot, but I like it simply because it’s John T. Murray doing it. I really need to check out more of this guy’s work, because he’s been so much fun in a lot of his appearances in these shorts. I especially love when he’s pretending to dance with himself at the party.
It’s not necessarily a masterpiece, and, again, I can see why people don’t like it because of it being kind of all over the place, but some other Chase Columbia shorts were like this too, and I definitely laughed more watching this than I did watching THE SAP TAKES A WRAP and the awful THE NIGHTSHIRT BANDIT. To me, this one’s alright.
7 out of 10