Buster Keaton -- Three Ages -- What the Well-Dressed Man of the Ages Should Wear -- March 4, 2024

Photoplay, March, 1924

This post is part of the Tenth Annual Buster Keaton Blogathon, hosted by Lea at Silent-ology. A blogathon that has lived for ten years is a rare creature

For the first annual blogathon, I wrote about Buster Keaton's time in vaudeville: The 3-4-5 Keatons.
For the second annual blogathon, I wrote about Buster Keaton and the Passing Show of 1917, the show he signed for after leaving vaudeville.
For the third annual blogathon, I wrote about Buster's transition from vaudeville to the movies, Buster Keaton: From Stage to Screen.
For the fourth annual blogathon, I wrote about Buster Keaton's time in the US Army: Buster Keaton Goes to War.
For the fifth annual blogathon, I wrote about Buster Keaton's time making short comedies with Roscoe Arbuckle, Comique: Roscoe, Buster, Al and Luke.
For the sixth annual blogathon I wrote about Buster Keaton's First Feature: The Saphead
For the seveth annual blogathon I wrote about Buster Keaton's Silent Shorts -- Reel One, a series of films produced during 1920-1921. Buster and his team had a very high batting average.
For the eighth annual blogathon, I started to write about the Buster Keaton shorts produced for the second season, 1921-1923. Buster Keaton's Silent Shorts -- Reel Two

For the ninth annual blogathon, I wrote about the rest of the Buster Keaton shorts produced for the second season, 1921-1923. Buster Keaton's Silent Shorts -- Reel Two and a Half

For the tenth annual blogathon, I have written about the first feature that Buster Keaton had control over, The Three Ages. 

Be sure to click on most images to see larger versions.

I first became interested in Buster Keaton when I watched The General with my grandfather and he told me how much he had always liked Buster Keaton.

When I discovered that the Anza Branch Library had a shelf of books about movies, I found two books about Buster Keaton, Buster's memoir My Wonderful World of Slapstick and Rudi Blesh's Keaton. I read both and I enjoyed learning about his career in vaudeville and his career in the movies.

Buster made a series of nineteen two-reel comedies in 1920-1922. No one ever asks me, but I tell people that this series of comedies and Charlie Chaplin's series for Mutual are the two best series of silent comedy shorts ever made. 

The movies of the first season had been released by Metro. The movies of the second season were released by First National. 

Motion Picture News, 03-February-1923

Buster's brother-in-law Joe Schenk negotiated with Metro to release Buster's features.  Most of his feature films would be distributed by Metro and its successors. 

Motion Picture News, 16-January-1924

Schenk made a deal with Metro to handle Buster's features. The plan was to make them five reels in length. "The first Keaton comedy is called 'The Three Ages.' The comedian recently completed this on the west coast under the direction of Eddie Cline. It is characterized as a burlesque on civilization."

listal.com

Many sources say that Three Ages is a parody of DW Griffith's 1916 epic Intolerance. I'm still looking for contemporary sources that say it was. 

Intolerance is an incredibly complicated movie that weaves together four stories which were set in wildly different eras. The fall of Babylon is set in 539 BCE. The story of Jesus, shortest of the four, took place around 30 CE. The Saint Bartholomew's Day massacre took place in 1572 CE. The modern story took place about 1915 CE. The film was not a simple presentation of four stories in order, but it jumped from place and time to place and time. 

Ridgewood Herald-News, 11-January-1923

"Buster Keaton, he of the solemn visage, is no longer a featured two-reel comedy star." Buster and his crew were working on a script. 

Motion Picture News, 08-September-1923

"Buster Keaton to Discard Pancake Hat." Gasp! He was going to ditch it for two-thirds of Three Ages and almost all of Our Hospitality.

listal.com

Three Ages, as the title implies, was set in three eras, prehistoric, ancient Roman and modern times. The three stories are lightly intertwined. Some sources say that if the movie had not been a success, it could have been cut into three two-reelers, but I haven't seen any contemporary references to that. 

The prehistoric story includes many anachronisms and stereotypes, such as a woman getting hit with a club as a courtship ritual, and Buster riding on the back of a stop-motion dinosaur. 

In the Roman story, Buster's chariot has a rear-mounted spare wheel and a license plate. He parks next to a No Parking sign in Latin and a cop tells him to move on. 

"The Present Age of Speed, Need and Greed" begins with Buster's Model T Ford disintegrating when it hits a rut in the road. 

The film continues, offering a variation on the same situation in each era. In each story, Buster competes with big, mean Wallace Beery for the hand of Margaret Leahy and Leahy's father, played by giant Joe Roberts favors Beery. Watch for the chariot race in the snow. 

Motion Picture News, 18-August-1923

Metro touted Three Ages with an expensive four-page ad with color in Motion Picture News. 

Motion Picture News, 14-July-1923

Three Ages premiered in London on 25-June-1923. Among the attendees were the Queen Mother Alexandra, mother of King George V and Princess Alice, wife of the king's brother, Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester.  

Perhaps the premier was in London was because leading lady Margaret Leahy was British. She toured the UK doing personal appearances where the movie was shown. Buster's sister-in-law Norma Talmadge had brought Leahy to the US. Norma received a thank you note from Princess Alice for her kindness to Leahy. 

Birmingham Age-Herald, 07-October-1923

"Six Reels of Mirth and Thrills." The five-reel thing didn't quite work out. 

I like the design of this ad for the Loew's Bijou in Birmingham, Alabama. The accompanying vaudeville program sounds like fun. The 3 Maxellas were "Superb Risley Gymnasts." Richard Risley Carlisle was a famous 19th Century gymnast and juggler. He was often billed as "Professor Risley." He developed the Risley Act, a routine which involved an acrobat lying on his back and juggling children or objects with his feet. Doris and Al Lester offered "Breezy Farcical Bits." The Dinus and Belmont players presented "A Musical Frappé" with "A Little Nifty Nonsense."

Film Daily, 14-October-1923

Douglas Fairbanks, one of the biggest stars in the heavens, said he was "Crazy about 'The Three Ages.'" He would "Thoroughly recommend it for the tired motion-picture man -- of whom I'm one these days." 

Indianapolis Star, 29-October-1923

This ad includes the stone age cliche of a man holding a club and carrying off a woman. "Something new in Comedy Pictures."

Moscow, Idaho Daily Star-Mirror, 01-December-1923

This ad for Moscow, Idaho's Kenworthy Theater shows Roman Buster with a lion. This is one of my favorite scenes in the film. If they had already launched the Academy Awards in 1923, the lion should have won Best Supporting Actor -- or Actress. 

Motion Picture News, 19-January-1924

CD Haug, "Metro's exploitation representative," helped the Crown theater in Mobile with "several novel exploitation stunts."

Motion Picture News, 08-December-1923

Loewe's New Orleans Crescent Theater held a Keaton hat contest. They distributed five thousand cut-out paper hats and gave tickets to the first twenty children who brought in one of the hats. 

San Francisco Chronicle, 08-October-1923

And then things got weird. Three Ages played in San Francisco at the New Mission and the New Fillmore, both owned by the Nasser brothers. "The Theaters Beautiful." The New Fillmore closed before I was born. My family used to eat at a restaurant near the New Mission. I remember its distinctive blade sign, but I don't think I saw a movie there before it became a furniture store in the early 1980s. I was surprised in the early 2000s, when the Alamo Drafthouse took over the building and converted it into a five-screen theater. All of this is not the weird thing. 

I wonder if my grandfather went to see the movie at the New Fillmore. He was living with his parents on John Street near the Cable Car Barn at Washington and Mason. He could have caught an outbound  Washington/Mason cable car at Mason and transferred to a southbound 22-Fillmore streetcar. This is not the weird thing, either. 

San Francisco Chronicle, 08-October-1923

Motion Picture News, 01-December-1923

What was weird was that this billboard showed up in two locations in San Francisco. It said "Prepare! K. K. K. is Coming!" This may have startled some people. The Second Ku Klux Klan was thriving in many parts of the US in 1923, but I don't think it had much influence in San Francisco. The members of the Klan hated African-Americans, Jewish people, Roman Catholics and foreigners. San Francisco's African-American population was very small before World War Two, but Jewish people, Roman Catholics and immigrants, like my grandfather and his family, made up a significant part of San Francisco's population. 

As the caption says, it turns out that "K. K. K." stood for "Keaton's Kolossal Komedy." I don't think that is a good slogan. 

Motion Picture News, 01-December-1923

And here we have another Metro trade paper ad with color. The walking billboard says the movie was playing at Loewe's Warfield, a theater on Market Street.

Motion Picture News, 03-November-1923

It turned out that the "K. K. K. is Coming!" campaign was created by "Metro Exploitation representative" CD Haug in Nashville. "Nashville Will Soon Know the Power of K. K. K." I believe that at this time the Klan had more influence in Nashville than it did in San Francisco. 

Los Angeles Times, 01-April-1923

Speaking of weird, while all of this was going on, Buster learned that there was a racehorse named "Buster Keaton." He went to see the horse run and later his sister-in-law Norma Talmadge bought an ownership share in Buster Keaton -- the horse.

And on top of that, in 2018 someone in South Africa named a thoroughbred gelding racehorse Buster Keaton. In 2024 he is still active, but appears to have only one first-place finish. 

This post is part of the Tenth Annual Buster Keaton Blogathon, hosted by Lea at Silent-ology. It is amazingly impressive to me to see a blogathon go on for ten years. Thank you to Lea for all the hard work. Thank you to everyone who visited, and I encourage you to read and comment on as many posts as you can. Bloggers love comments.