Joe E. Brown: Film Comedian and Baseball Buffoon

by Wes D. Gehring

Overview

As a young boy in the depths of the 1890s depression, Joe E. Brown had a job: making faces at the firemen on passing coal-burning trains so they would throw coal at him. As a child he also worked as a circus acrobat and newsboy. His inventiveness and spunk helped his family get through hard times but also fueled his fascination with entertainment, and he built up a repertoire of rubber-faced expressions and funny antics that would make his stage and screen work memorable. Baseball was a favorite pursuit in his life and thus a recurring theme in his films and skits.

In this biography—the first on one of the top film comedians of the 1930s—the reader learns of Joe's challenging childhood and how it prepared him for later screen roles, and how his love of baseball translated into screen successes. His early career in vaudeville is discussed, his work as a Broadway comedian in the Roaring Twenties, his road to movie stardom, and how he parlayed his love of sports into big hits like 1930's Elmer the Great. The year 1935 gets its own chapter; its films are considered the pinnacle of Brown's career, including Alibi Ike, Bright Lights and A Midsummer Night's Dream. The final chapters reveal what happened after he left Warner Bros., including the bittersweet 1940s, when he entertained troops around the globe while mourning a son lost to the war. The book concludes with a comprehensive filmography of his features from 1928 to 1963.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780786425891
Publisher:	McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Publication date:	09/28/2006
Pages:	228
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.46(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Wes D. Gehring is the Distinguished Professor of Film at Ball State University, and the author of 44 books, keying on biographies of film comedians and comic genres. Their reception has resulted in speaking engagements from the Paris-Sorbonne University to New York's Museum of Modern Art. He has periodically been one of Turner Classic Movies' on-screen scholars for their summer online classes.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Foreword by Conrad Lane     
Preface and Acknowledgments     

1. “It Takes Guts to Be a Kinker [Acrobat]”     
2. Acrobat to Actor ... But Ever the Athlete     
3. A Solo Stage Star     
4. Making It in the Movies     
5. Top Speed—More Than a Film Title     
6. Lardner & Brown and the National Game     
7. Between the Baseball Pictures: 1932–34     
8. Brown’s Memorable 1935     
9. Before the Fall     
10. Creative Free Fall and the Children’s Advocate     
11. “G. I. Joe” for Your Kids and Mine     
12. The Last Act     

Afterword     
Joe E. Brown Filmography     
Chapter Notes     
Bibliography     
Index     

Editorial Reviews

Gehring remains supreme in film comedy scholarship”—Choice; “Just about anything with film historian and media writer Wes D. Gehring’s name on it will be of quality.”—Cinema Retro; “fascinating”—Sports Collectors Digest; “the first biography of the comedian...worthwhile”—The Slide Area.

From the Publisher

"the first biography of the comedian...worthwhile"

The Slide Area

fascinating

Sports Collectors Digest