Room 1219: Fatty Arbuckle, the Mysterious Death of Virginia Rappe, and the Scandal That Changed Hollywood (55 page)

As surprising as it was for Hays to bar Arbuckle from movie screens, it was more shocking when he reinstated him eight months later. On December 20, 1922, Arbuckle received what the press called an early Christmas present when Hays dropped a grenade disguised as a statement:

Every man in the right way and at the proper time is entitled to his chance to make good. It is apparent that Roscoe Arbuckle’s conduct
since his trouble merits that chance. So far as I am concerned, there will be no suggestion now that he should not have his opportunity to go to work in his profession. In our effort to develop a complete co-operation and confidence within the industry, I hope we can start this New Year with no yesterdays. “Live and let live” is not enough; we will try to live and help live.

The grenade would go off shortly thereafter.

In his memoirs, Hays claimed he reinstated Arbuckle only after long deliberation:

It was not my wish that he again become a movie actor, as many at the time professed to believe, nor was I exuding sentimentality for a comedian whom I had never met. I merely refused to stand in the man’s way of earning a living in the only business he knew…. It did seem to me that if work could be found for the man as a comedy director, perhaps, or as a technician, it was not my job to bar him from such a chance. In a spirit of American fair play, and I hope of Christian charity, I proposed that he be given a chance.

In fact, the April 18 banishment had been vague, merely stating that at Hays’s request Paramount had “cancelled all showings and all bookings of the Arbuckle films.” That said, with Paramount shelving two unreleased Fatty features, the implication was clear: don’t work with Arbuckle. The December 20 “pre-Christmas pardon” was clearer: Arbuckle’s films are again welcome on-screen, and producers are free to employ him.

Hays had received pressure to make this reversal from theater owners eager to screen Fatty films; from studios other than Paramount, worried about the precedent of the MPPDA hampering profits; from editorialists; and from letter-writing members of the public. Still, there was no major groundswell of public support. Perhaps Hays had simply heard from enough sympathetic industry people while in Los Angeles. With the trials long over and Arbuckle’s association with Paramount a faded memory, Zukor and company had gotten what they wanted from the
banishment and likely had no concerns about their previous comedy superstar beginning an association with a new studio.

Hays later professed, “It seemed a relatively commonplace decision to me, and I anticipated no such excitement as ensued…. But for the next three months it became a
cause célèbre
… as newspaper editorials and civic leagues presented me with every public building in the country, brick by brick.”

Those bricks, and lots of them, would start to bombard Hays before December 20 was done, but first there was euphoria. Arbuckle rushed into Schenck’s office at 10 A
M,
seeking confirmation of what he had heard from reporters and so excited that he was, the
Los Angeles Times
reported, shaking and “stammering so badly that he had difficulty in making himself understood.” What he’d heard was true. A brief formal statement from Arbuckle was drafted and handed out to the press: “Mr. Hays has made his decision. It is my intention in every way to live up to what Mr. Hays expects of me.” A perfectly bland pronouncement, stripped of any sense of triumph, from a man who was then experiencing the heights of exuberance.

“I cannot say just now how soon we can get a picture for him or what kind of pictures he will make,” Schenck said. “Stories do not come out of thin air, and we must have something suitable to him, something in his character. I have received many telegrams today from all parts of the country congratulating me and Arbuckle. People have been saying nice things over the phone. I believe the American public is just, and that it has come to realize that Arbuckle should be back on the screen.”

Around the time Schenck said that, the Los Angeles Federation of Women’s Clubs held an emergency meeting and passed a motion calling for Arbuckle to never again appear on-screen. The Illinois Motion Picture Association promptly announced that Fatty movies would not play in any of its theaters. His cinematic image wasn’t welcome in Michigan’s theaters either. Or in Boston or Indianapolis. And on and on. In many cases, municipalities merely reasserted bans that had been in place since shortly after his arrest. Protesting telegrams deluged Hays—from religious groups, women’s groups, teachers’ groups.

Two days after their hasty statement, Illinois theater owners reversed it, deciding to let Arbuckle’s films screen—if the public wanted to see them. The same “let the people decide” edict was enacted in New York and California. The Motion Picture Directors Association, which under the late William Taylor had been ardently anticensorship, held a lengthy emergency meeting and, after a contentious debate, passed a controversial resolution that did not mention Arbuckle but stated “that under no circumstance should any person or persons who by their actions have proven a menace to the well-being of our industry be tolerated or excused.” Responding to pressure from women’s clubs, the mayor of Los Angeles vowed to keep Arbuckle off his city’s screens. He telegraphed his protest to Hays, as did many other politicians. On December 23 Hays responded with telegrams of his own, claiming he was not reinstating Arbuckle but would not stand in the way of him making a living. The equivocation pleased no one.

Arbuckle released a statement that appeared in newspapers on Christmas morning. “All I ask is the rights of an American citizen—American fair play,” it began, before rehashing his acquittal and then arguing that those “who are unjustly, untruthfully, maliciously and venomously attacking me are refusing to abide by the established law of the land” as well as “a higher law.” In regards to the latter, the previously irreligious Arbuckle (or whoever wrote his statement) had much to say, quoting scripture and accusing his ministerial critics of ignoring the spirit of the Bible. He asked what his opponents would have thought of Jesus forgiving the penitent thief: “Would not some of these persons have denounced Christ and stoned him for what he said?” Arbuckle asked if Christianity was about charity or “a thing of only teeth and claws.” In conclusion: “The sentiment of every church on Christmas Day will be ‘Peace on Earth and good will to all mankind.’ What will be the attitude the day after Christmas to me?”

The day after the day after Christmas, the San Francisco Federation of Women’s Clubs met to urge Hays’s banishment of Arbuckle in order to make an example “of those who brazenly violate the moral code of a Christian nation.”

Theatrical producer Arthur Hammerstein offered Paramount $1 million for the two never-released feature films as well as the barely released
Gasoline Gus.
When that was refused, he offered to exhibit the features for only 10 percent of their profits, so confident was he that they would be successful. Referencing a screening of an Arbuckle movie in New York City two days earlier, Hammerstein said, “The crowd was so anxious to see him that they nearly broke down the doors. Whenever people are told they ought not to see a certain thing that’s the very thing they are most eager to see.” Paramount did not budge.

Over the final days of 1922, Arbuckle journeyed to San Francisco. There his former defense attorney Gavin McNab and financiers organized a company with $100,000 of funding to produce Fatty movies in Los Angeles. Subsequently, Arbuckle wrote the script for a two-reel comedy,
Handy Andy.

The debate raged into the new year. Hays selected the members of an advisory group of religious and civic leaders, but he disagreed with their resolution urging him to advise producers against releasing any Fatty movies. After a long conference with the committee, Hays issued his “final statement,” saying that he was leaving it up to the public, Arbuckle’s employers, and Arbuckle himself, and that in doing so he was removing himself as judge.

Perhaps it would have been different had Arbuckle never been banned. Perhaps he could have weathered the initial outrage regarding his return to movies, and the protesters would have grown quieter over time and silenced with the popularity of new Fatty features. Instead, he had escaped punishment from the courts only to receive it from the movie industry, and by reversing its sentence eight months later it appeared as if that industry suddenly condoned his booze-fueled “orgy.” The two decisions together could seem like a whitewash: let Arbuckle have some time off to jaunt about the world and then let him return to cinematic stardom like nothing had happened.

If it had been about just one man, even one as famous as Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, his presumptive return never would have created the momentous firestorm it did. This was about much more. It was America’s first great battle in a culture war. Society was changing fast—too fast for
many—and Hollywood, with its drugs, its sexual libertinism, its flaunting of Prohibition, its disrespect for authority, and its moral relativism, was at the forefront of this change. Or so the editorialists said, over and over again—and with renewed vigor once Wallace Reid’s drug addiction became common knowledge. Motion pictures themselves were a new and powerful force, having soared to prominence within the previous decade, and people were still coming to terms with a technology that permitted Fatty to ogle a young woman on thousands of screens. The outrage was great that a man who now represented the worst of Hollywood immorality could be welcomed back onto those screens.

Arbuckle’s heights of euphoria on December 20 were supplanted by depths of despair the following weeks when he realized his hopes of returning to the life he knew before had been dashed. An article in January portrayed Arbuckle as depressed. He had gone from the stately West Adams mansion, his home during the height of his fame and fortune, to “a little obscure cabin in Hollywood” where he lived with Luke the loyal dog. “I just want to work and to make people laugh—and to eat,” he said. The day that article ran, January 10, was the day he began acting in
Handy Andy.
It was never released and likely never finished.

Arbuckle would retreat behind the camera. On January 31 came the announcement that he had signed to direct five shorts for Reel Comedies, Joseph Schenck’s new company, incorporated the day prior. Among those backing the venture were Lou Anger, Buster Keaton, and, again, Gavin McNab. The movies would be distributed by Educational Pictures, a small company previously known for instructional films. Arbuckle said that directing was “a chance to make good in the right way”—and that he was done with acting. A reporter who talked with the ostracized actor several times during this period remembered, “He was very bitter over what he believed was injustice, which financially and professionally ruined him. I had never seen a more hopeless man.”

Arbuckle did appear in a film in 1923—and for Paramount. James Cruze, director of five of his Paramount features, made
Hollywood,
a comedy feature about the struggles to find movie industry success. It was
loaded with cameos by celebrities, including Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary Pickford. But one uncredited bit part stole the show. When the hapless heroine joins a casting cattle call, an unrevealed overweight man steps aside to give the nervous wannabe his place. After she strikes out, the man steps up to the casting director’s window for his turn, only to have the window slammed in his face. He stares at C
LOSED
on the window before the camera reveals his identity: Roscoe Arbuckle. “It was a superbly forcible touch, inserted in the picture without comment,” a reviewer opined. “Whether one feels sympathy or contempt for Arbuckle, one cannot deny that this was a vitally dramatic moment in
Hollywood.”
The movie played with no notable protests. Instead, Arbuckle’s appearance was applauded at screenings, including in San Francisco, two years after Labor Day.

Ultimately, Arbuckle was not credited for his work directing, writing, and producing shorts for Reel Comedies, as publicizing his involvement would provide little upside and raise the potential for protests. His unacknowledged efforts began in February 1923 with
Easter Bonnets,
which allowed him to finally cast the now-twenty-three-year-old actress Doris Deane, whom he had met and courted on the steamship
Harvard
the day after Labor Day 1921. The next five shorts starred Edwin “Poodles” Hanneford, a circus clown noted for his horse-riding tricks. The work occupied Arbuckle’s time and provided a creative outlet, but it brought little of the joy he had experienced as a movie star.