Get the Ricochet app

Ricochet will work fine in a browser on your mobile devices, but for the best experience please download our app.

Download on the App StoreGet it on Google Play

Become a member.

Tired of the toxicity of social media? Why not join Ricochet for just $5/month? Think of it as an online bar. Come in, have a drink, hang out, say whatever you want. But don’t badger, bully, or berate the other drinkers. That's our only rule.

Happy birthday, Buster Keaton!

Douglas Pratt
@DouglasPratt
Join to bookmark15likesJoin to like15comments
Source: Wikimedia Commons

In 2013 I narrated Cut to the Chase by Marion Meade, an excellent biography of Buster Keaton. I wish I had done a better job, but I was still learning my craft at the time. Still, it has sold well; not surprisingly, because of the quality of the writing and the subject. Keaton was a brilliant but humble man, who knew his craft and performed it.

I highly recommend one of his last projects, the short film "The Railrodder" done for the Film Board of Canada. It's one of the funniest things I've ever seen. It starts with him walking across the Atlantic Ocean to visit Canada, which he does by accidentally stealing a single-seat railroad car.

One of the critics who wrote about Keaton said that he had the ability to make the space around him seem funny. In "The Railrodder," you can watch him do it with the entire country of Canada.

From "The Railrodder" Wikimedia Commons

This post was promoted to the Main Feed at the recommendation of Ricochet's members.

Discussion (15)

Scroll for later comments
+10 more comments
Join the conversation

You're seeing five of 15 comments. Sign in, or join for just $5 per month, to read them all and add your own.