The Chases of Pimple Street

Loud and annoying does not equal comedy. Charley Chase had a great silent film career but unfortunately sound came along and Charley just became obnoxious. Mighty low brow stuff that's poorly executed even by 3 Stooges standards. Inexplicably high IMDb rating.

IMDb wants ten lines of text for this review but frankly there isn't enough to this curiously high rated dreck to write ten lines about.

The terrible direction is credited to Chase but nobody's taking claim for writing this witless, vapid, tired (tired by Vaudville standards) tripe. What could possibly be the mystery of the high rating? This is just stupid. Funny's funny and this ain't funny.

CHARLIE CHASE seems to be using silent screen technique for his broad antics on display here in THE CHASES OF PIMPLE STREET. He's amusing as a hen-pecked husband whose sister lives under the same roof with him and his wife. She exasperates him to the point of hysteria, but when his boss needs an extra "girl" for a party, he has to use his own wife as the girl when his sister is mistakenly identified by his boss as his wife. Does that make any sense? Well, of course, it doesn't really. It's a merry mix-up and Chase makes the most of it. The early scenes in the busy household with Charlie shut out of his own bathroom by his sister-in-law are funnier than what takes place later at the party.

In other words, it's an uneven comedy, getting laughs where it should but not over-the-top hilarious.

Summing up: Enjoyable two-reeler owes a lot to Chase's skill as a comedian with silent screen technique embedded in his acting, as late as 1934.

Chases of Pimple St. (1934)

*** (out of 4)

Charley Chase comedy has him play a tormented husband who's married to a lovely wife. The only problem is that the wife's sister lives with them and refuses to move out. I'm actually a pretty big fan of Chase's silent shorts and find them more entertaining and funny that those of Harold Lloyd. I had heard his sound shorts weren't as good but I find them just as funny. There are countless gags in this film including a wonderful sequence where Chase must get ready downstairs because his sister in law is in the bathroom. The film starts off with a stupid musical number but gets better after that.

Charley has to find a date for his boss, and in the mix-up he has his wife, Betty Mack, portraying his sister-in-law, while his sister-in-law, Ruthelma Hill, is supposed to be his wife.

It's not original, and Chase had done it a couple of times before, particularly in the silent era. He often reused a plot, but the different gags he put in each time made them very different. Here he sings a duet with Miss Mack, and the guy he has to get a date for is Arthur Housman, as hilariously drunk and befuddled as he ever was.

In "The Chases of Pimple Street" - its title a spoof of the 1934 drama "The Barretts Of Wimpole Street" - is a funny little two-reeler from a period when Charley frequently churned out shorts that cannot be compared to his best silent work but which were still constantly amusing. In this one, Charley happily volunteers his bragging sister-in-law, Celeste, to his boss who urgently needs a girl to entertain an out-of-town client. Alas, his sister-in-law is not on time for the meeting and so Charley has to present his wife as the girl for his boss' client while Celeste, who arrives later, is introduced as his wife. Later, the whole company visits a dance hall and complications arouse which ultimately lead to Charley losing his job.

With its clever mixture of sight gags and situational comedy, "TCOPS" is a thoroughly enjoyable Chase sound short, one of his best from that particular period. Nice to see Arthur Housman sober for a few minutes.