Stuart Oderman's book on Roscoe is more that of a fan than a biographer. Oderman makes his living playing live accompaniment to silent films. He relates the salient facts and anecdotes, but has neither the distance nor much of the reliance on speculation of a usual biographer, not a bad approach in this case. Many of the details of Arbuckle's life were new to me, for instance his abandonment by his father at age 12 when relatives put him on a train to San Jose and his father skipped out of town before he arrived, performing was initially just a way to survive and beat washing dishes in the hotel, so he gravitated to being a so-called illustrated singer, a staple of Vaudeville lineups. He toured all over the country in Vaudeville and even some legitimate theatre, even toured China and Japan in The Mikado, prior to ever setting foot in front of a camera. Later he had occasion to meet Caruso and sing for him, and was told he might have made it in an opera chorus.

The core of Oderman's book, its perspective, is largely based upon a series of interviews he conducted with Minta Durfee, Arbuckle's first wife and one of his co-stars both on stage and at Keystone, prior to her death in the mid 70's. Despite having separated from Arbuckle in 1917, and him twice remarrying, she remained loyal to his memory right up to the end. The scandal is dealt with in workmanlike fashion, but it's the least interesting part of the story.

Laughsmith's The Forgotten Films of Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle makes a wonderful companion to the book. The four DVDs are organized chronologically, disc one begins with Fatty Joins the Force from November 1913 and disc four concludes with Bridge Wives, a short directed by Arbuckle in 1932. It would have been nice if some of those last shorts in which he acted just prior to his death had been included, but perhaps they're lost or another volume is being planned. In any case the 32 films included in the set show Arbuckle's enormous impact on everyone from Keaton to Chaplin to Curly Howard to Jackie Gleason. Keaton always acknowledged his debt, saying Arbuckle had taught him everything he knew about film, but others have gotten the credit for many of his innovations. How many who laud Chaplin for the dancing potatoes in The Gold Rush know that it's a riff on a gag with dinner rolls tossed off by Arbuckle in The Rough House six years earlier.

The early Keystone films were built on very simple premises, and it's easy to see how quickly Arbuckle, Chaplin and Mabel Normand grew beyond the confines of Sennett's simplistic vision. Still there are numerous fine bits, inventive gags and a truly wonderful chemistry between Arbuckle and Mabel Normand, in the eight Fatty and Mabel films included. Sadly Fatty and Mabel Adrift, one of their best, is not part of this set, perhaps because it was included in the Slapstick Encyclopedia box.

Disc one includes the two films Arbuckle made with Chaplin, The Knockout and The Rounders, as well as the first few of the Fatty and Mabel series.

Parks figure large in Keystone films, most of them taking place in either Griffith, Echo or others in the LA area. Wished on Mabel is an exception and a particular favorite. A very simple little film based around a stolen watch, which was directed by Normand and shot in Golden Gate Park in 1915. Several of the films include commentary by members of the Silent Movie Mafia, who impart interesting comical details of the films and cast.

Disc three includes another of the best Keystones, He Did and He Didn't, which like Fatty and Mabel Adrift was made in Fort Lee, NJ away from Sennett's grasp, and thus features much more sophisticated and subtle work in which Normand and Arbuckle both shine. A hitherto thought lost film, Love, made in 1919 while Keaton was still away in France is also included. Only one of the Arbuckle / Keaton collaborations appears here, Fatty at Coney Island, but those are all available in other collections.

Disc four begins with Leap Year, the last of Arbuckle's feature length films finished prior to the scandal which destroyed his career. It was released only in Europe. The impact of the scandal is clear as so many of his films like this one have only survived in European archives. The remainder of disc five is taken up with shorts Arbuckle directed under pseudonyms after he was banned from the screen. His friends got together and set up a company to produce two reelers in order to provide him with income. Keaton went so far as to sign 30% of his own profits over to Arbuckle. My Stars is a clever little farce with Johnny Arthur as the suitor of a woman who only has eyes for pin ups of matinee idols she receives in the mail. He gets the idea of becoming these stars for her, and transforms himself into Valentino as the Sheik only to find that she's moved onto Fairbanks. He then does himself up as Robin Hood by which time she's on to someone else. At one point she tells her butler how dreamy some idol is, to which he replies his favorite is Buster Keaton, a clear Arbuckle touch. Fool's Luck has English acrobat Lupino Lane, some relation to Ida, as a fop whose uncle has cut him off, having to vacate his hotel suite for lack of funds. There's a great gag in which he finds himself atop a piano as it's lowered from a window several stories in the air.

The set is rounded out by a 35 page booklet of essays and notes. I hope this will allow for the reassessment of the work of the silent comic whose never received his due. Laughsmith's site announces two new books being prepared on Arbuckle, one an assessment of all of his films and the other devoted to clearing his name once and for all. There are also rumors that they may produce a similarly lavish set devoted to Mabel Normand, which would be wonderful news, if true.