Happy Birthday: Buster Keaton (1895–1966)

busterkeaton.jpgBuster Keaton (1895–1966)

Born: October 4, 1895 in Piqua, Kansas, USA
Died: February 1, 1966 (age 70) in Los Angeles, California, USA

I’ve had few dull moments [in my life] and not too many sad and defeated ones. In saying this, I am by no means overlooking the rough and rocky years I’ve lived through. But I was not brought up thinking life would be easy. I always expected to work hard for my money and to get nothing I did not earn. And the bad years, it seems to me, were so few that only a dyed-in-the-wool grouch who enjoys feeling sorry for himself would complain.

The Boat: Short Film
1921
dir. Keaton
starring
Keaton
the balloonatic buster keatonThe Balloonatic
1923
dir. Keaton
Starring
Keaton
Phyllis Haver
THE FROZEN NORTHThe Frozen North
1922
dir. Keaton
Edward F. Cline
starring
Keaton
Bonnie Hill
COPSCops
1922
dir. Keaton
Edward F. Cline
starring
Keaton
Virginia Fox
Sherlock Jr
1924
dir. Keaton
starring
Keaton
Kathryn McGuire
The GeneralThe General
1927
dir. Keaton
Clyde Bruckman
starring
Keaton
Marion Mack
AT THE CIRCUSAt the Circus
1939
dir. Edward Buzzell
starring
The Marx Bros
Keaton co-writer
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the ForumA Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
1966
dir. Richard Lester
Starring
Zero Mostel

Born in 1895 in Kansas, into a vaudeville family performing with the likes of Houdini (who coined his name ‘Buster’), Keaton was an early physical talent.

He entered film in his early twenties making shorts, and was deemed a star upon his first feature, 1920’s The Saphead. Keaton wrote, directed and starred in many of his own films, as well as doing studio comedies which did not garner him critical success.

With the discovery of lost stock of his early work, and 1952’s Limelight with Charlie Chaplin, Buster was finally recognized as an icon of his genre. Buster Keaton died in 1966.

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