Labor Day Morning, 1921

By James Reidel

. . . no power on the earth could keep the smear off
Rosemary — the paint was scarcely dry on the Arbuckle case.

He kept shaving, kept pretending that “Fatty” wasn’t aware of he moonfaced Maid played by himself. He watched both cranking away in his mind’s eye, watching himself naked in the moviola and pausing over intertitle, CATCH OF THE DAY! Then comes the jump cut to the Maid, who tries to bashfully hide behind a tall stack of Turkish towels, batting her eyes, putting her finger to her lip in that famous “Fatty” way. HEY, THROW ME ONE, WILL YA! When he / she does, it’s a dish towel that “Fatty” snatches and tries to cover his girth in vain — across his belly, across his chest, his rear, his flanks, before he thinks: A FIG LEAF! Now the camera pans on a now tiny towel embroidered with ST. FRANCIS HOTEL. Jump cut to the Maid getting a good laugh in and her intertitle: NOW THAT’S A ‘SHORT’! Then it’s “Fatty’s” turn to get back. He snaps the towel at the Maid — one, two, three — until it magically reaches her butt as she hightails it into the hotel bedroom and stumbles headlong over the rail at the foot of a brass bed. Now “Fatty” brings the house down. Now he’s wearing a great big towel wrapped around his waist. He stalks toward the Maid, one bare foot after another, like he was a boy again, rope–dancing for pennies. There’s his famous smile! He’s putting his finger to his lips again — telling everyone in their seats to keep quiet. He tiptoes up through the hotel room, right behind the Maid. Then, another jump cut to “Fatty” dressed as the Maid, an iris shot opening on a pair of oversized knickers — frilly, garters, parted legs kicking helplessly in the air. A bull’s–eye inked right on the film! — that’s what he sees still shaving his cheek with one eye shut, getting a bead, as the real maid whispers an apology, curtseys, and leaves him alone again. He puts the straight razor down on the pedestal sink. The gag comes. “Fatty” takes off the towel like a toreador, and snaps it once more at the Maid — once, twice, and abracadabra — and turns her into a girl giving the hero a teasing, million–dollar smile over a bared shoulder.