THE DENTIST is the first of four short films W.C. Fields made for Mack Sennett. In his early fifties at this point, his career up until now was commercially more successful on stage than it was in film. He made some starring silent features for Paramount in the late twenties that never caught on, so he’s making short films and playing supporting roles in talkies, trying to re-establish himself in film. Fields must have been trying to really get the attention of the public by being as brazen as possible, because THE DENTIST is about as vulgar a film one can make in 1932, even by pre code standards. He also makes no attempt at being likable. In his later mature talking Paramount features, Fields usually balanced his curmudgeonly nature with ounces of humanity, but nothing of the kind here. We’re expected to laugh at a completely boorish individual and for me at least, mission accomplished.
As a character, Fields is very strong willed and will never admit fault or show any empathy. He makes up the rules of golf to his benefit, throws temper tantrums when things don’t go his way by launching his golf clubs into the water followed by his poor gaslighted caddy. Not a man one would want to play golf with, but he’s sure a ball of energy and nerve suitable for a comedy. Field’s unfortunate golf partner in THE DENTIST is none other than Bud Jamison.
As far as vulgarity, for 1932 - wow. Let’s start with his daughter, played by Babe Kane (eight years later the French maid Curly flirts with in NO CENSUS, NO FEELING). After a few good verbal gags about Fields misplacing things and the daughter telling him said things are right by him (similar to Oliver Hardy’s missing hat that’s on his head in HOG WILD), Field’s tries to get his daughter’s attention about a newspaper article. She’s bending over by the ice box, so in order to get her attention, Fields give her a tap on the butt. Now it’s strange enough for a man to tap his daughter on the butt for attention. For the topper, not realizing it’s her father, she responds by placing an order of ice, thinking it’s the ice man doing the tapping. So in one fell swoop, we establish Fields has boundary issues and the daughter gives away to her father she’s quite physically intimate with the ice man. Throughout the short, Fields locks her in her room and she stomps on the ground, causing things to fall from the ceiling into the mouths of his patients. As an aside, there is a great ice gag where Fields has trouble getting a big chunk of ice in the ice box, gets in a phone conversation while the big ice is melting on the stove and puts the melted smaller ice in the ice box with ease.
Yes, Fields is a dentist like the title suggests and the majority of this short is just an excuse for him to do some funny sketches around this premise. First patient, the lovely Dorothy Granger. Speaking of bending over, she does this as well. First she shows off her leg, saying how the doctors mentions she has a bad leg. Fields says the doctor is off his rocker. Then she bends over and mentions how a little dog bit her leg. This is is simply an excuse for W.C. Fields to check out her backside, there’s no way around it. Again, getting the audience to have their jaw drop, as this was not common, even in pre code films. I should mention when Field’s assistant mentioned Ms. Granger was ready and Fields was busy, his response was, “To Hell with her.” Also to add to the fun, probably more shocking to modern audiences, some politically incorrect humor when Fields mentions a doctor treated a man for yellow jaundice for nine years before he found out the patient was Japanese.
Oh, but it doesn’t stop there. Next patient in line is Fields regular Elsie Cavanna. Now Ms. Cavanna was about six feet tall, so naturally she had really long legs. This is important to the scene in question. You see, as Fields is pulling her tooth, (he asks her at one point if she ever had this tooth pulled before), she squirms. As she squirms, her foot gets caught in Fields coat pocket and eventually, her legs are wrapped around him as he’s pulling her tooth. Yes, it looks like they’re screwing as he’s doing dental work. A very funny bit of physical comedy, I never fail to laugh at this scene.
So we have the word Hell. We have Fields checking out a patient’s ass, quite blatantly. She’s also showing it off, quite blatantly. We have tooth pulling scenes that look like a Kama Sutra manual. We have paternal butt tapping and daughters admission the ice man is doing some butt tapping. Something tells me this one wouldn’t fly after June 1934. Throw in the fact Fields is about the most unlikable he’s ever been on screen and it all adds up to THE DENTIST being one of the most daring comedies ever put on the screen for its time. Love it or hate it, I promise you’ll never forget it. The same can be said for several others. The video linked above, posted in 2013, is close to one million views.
