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All-American Clown
Sooner or later, almost everyone who achieved stardom working for Sennett
left him, and Harry was no exception. Eager to show what he could do as
an independent producer, he signed a contract with First National (now represented
by his onetime boss, Sol Lesser!) that required him to produce two feature-length
films per year, at a set price per picture. (Thus, his "independence"
was always more fancied than real.) Langdon had brought along several members
of his Sennett team, and they got to work at once on his first independent
feature, Tramp, Tramp, Tramp.
Built around a cross-country walking race, Tramp, Tramp, Tramp (1926)
offered not so much a connected story as a series of vignettes that let
Harry do what he did best - mooning over a girl's picture and acting the
fool when he meets her face to face; hopping along one-legged behind a train,
an escaped prisoner, after he's thrown his ball-and-chain aboard; struggling
to bathe during a tornado, then scaring off the storm by heaving bricks
at it; and finally, when all's ended well, playing his most clueless self
as his own baby.
The film was well received, but it ran over budget. Rightly or wrongly,
common practice at the time was to blame the director for such failings:
whether Harry Edwards left on his own or was forced out (accounts vary),
Langdon found himself looking for a new director. He gave the job to former
gagman Frank Capra. The next picture, The Strong Man (1926), was
a well-publicized success. As the weakling assistant to a vaudeville strong
man, Harry single-handedly smashed the gambling den, saved the town, and
(of course) married the girl. It was a feel-good film if ever there was
one.
Behind the scenes, feelings weren't so good. Relations had grown strained
between Ripley, the writer, and Capra, his former 
protégé.
During the making of Long Pants (1927), Langdon increasingly sided
with his writer and against his director. As if that were not enough, it
now became clear just how onerous First National's terms really were. (At
the time, Chaplin was taking two to three years to turn out a feature, Lloyd
about a year; only Keaton was on a schedule like Langdon's.) Long Pants
was completed behind schedule and over budget, and Langdon - who had to
make up the difference out of his own pocket - fired Capra. Already the
star, and president of the Harry Langdon Corporation, now he would occupy
the director's chair himself.
Three's Heartbreak
Capra partisans have pointed to the commercial failure of Langdon's final
three pictures for First National - Three's a Crowd, The Chaser,
and Heart Trouble - to bolster their claims that firing their man
was a fatal mistake and that Langdon couldn't direct. Both points could
certainly be argued, and the controversy is unlikely ever to be settled.
What seems clear from the two surviving silent features directed by Langdon
(Heart Trouble is widely considered a lost film) is that if Ripley
was inclined toward the dark and grim, Langdon's artistic vision made a
good match. Three's a Crowd is a black comedy in which Harry, desperate
for a family of his own, loses all. In The Chaser, he spends most
of his time in drag, and his best gags revolve around suicide. This wasn't
what the public wanted to see in 1927-28, and the reviews were scathing.
It's been suggested that Heart Trouble may have marked the beginnings
of a comeback, but too late - First National chose not to renew Langdon's
contract.
Part III |
