Let's Build

Newlyweds Frank Butler and Laura Roessing, along with her brother, Sidney D'Albrook, decide to use a kit to build a house in 24 hours on their own lot. Being buffalo-headed amateurs, they botch the job and reap the comic results of their ineptitude.

Hal Roach's studio is well remembered for its short-subject comedy series, for the origins of Harold Lloyd, for the teaming of Laurel & Hardy, the origins of the Little Rascals, as well as for comics who were successful in their day, but have fallen out of favor, such as Charley Chase and Snub Pollard. Along the way, Roach tried out a few series that never clicked, either commercially or otherwise. Looking at this one-reel cut-down of the first of the series, and seeing how much it owes to Keaton's ONE WEEK, the fan of silent comedy can see it is an uninspired affair, with the performers merely adequate and the mechanical gags offered without much flair.

Roach would give up on it after a couple of years and move on to better things.