60 Fun Facts About Buster Keaton

Buster Keaton's stoic, unsmiling screen expression earned him what nickname?

He adopted the deadpan on stage as a child after noticing that audiences laughed less when he smiled.

What were Buster Keaton's real first and middle names?

He was born on October 4, 1895, into a touring vaudeville family.

Keaton was born in 1895 in Piqua, a small town in which US state?

Family lore also claimed a storm once carried the infant Buster four blocks and set him down unharmed.

By Keaton's own story, which famous performer nicknamed him 'Buster' after he tumbled down stairs unhurt?

The tale is probably apocryphal; another version credits an actor named George Pardey.

As a small child, Keaton performed with his parents in a vaudeville act billed as what?

His father would hurl him around the stage, and the act ran up against laws banning child performers.

Keaton's 1917 film debut 'The Butcher Boy' starred which comedian, who hired him on the spot?

Keaton went on to appear in 14 of his shorts, and later defended him publicly during the Virginia Rappe scandal.

During World War I, Keaton served in France with which unit of the US Army?

An ear infection contracted in uniform permanently damaged his hearing.

Which 1920 short about newlyweds assembling a sabotaged kit house was Keaton's first independent release?

The spinning house and the train collision were filmed for real, not with models.

In the opening sequence of the 1921 short 'The Playhouse', Keaton famously does what?

It was a jibe at producer Thomas Ince, who credited himself lavishly on his films.

In the 1922 short 'Cops', Keaton's character is chased by the entire LAPD after accidentally doing what?

The Los Angeles alley where it was shot is now named Chaplin-Keaton-Lloyd Alley.

Keaton's 1923 feature 'Our Hospitality' is built around a family feud modelled on which real one?

His wife and his father Joe Keaton both appear in the film.

In Sherlock Jr. (1924), what side ambition does Keaton's projectionist harbour?

The film's walk-into-the-screen conceit strongly influenced Woody Allen's 'The Purple Rose of Cairo'.

Keaton initially hired his disgraced friend and mentor to co-direct 'Sherlock Jr.' under which pseudonym?

His old boss was $750,000 in debt after the trials that followed Virginia Rappe's death.

In 'The Navigator' (1924), why does Keaton's wealthy Rollo Treadway end up adrift on an ocean liner?

To patch a leak he later dons a deep-sea diving suit, one of the film's most celebrated sequences.

In 'Seven Chances' (1925), Keaton's Jimmie must marry by 7 p.m. on his 27th birthday to inherit how much?

The famous avalanche of boulders chasing him downhill was added only after a preview screening.

Keaton's 1926 masterpiece 'The General' was inspired by which real Civil War episode?

The story came from William Pittenger's 1889 memoir; Keaton plays engineer Johnnie Gray.

Most of 'The General' was shot around Cottage Grove in which state, chosen for its old-fashioned railroads?

The cast and crew arrived in May 1926 with 18 freight cars of cannons, coaches and props.

In 'The General', what is the pursuing locomotive that plunges through the burning bridge called?

The shot was the most expensive single take of the silent era, and a real locomotive was destroyed for it.

Who played Annabelle Lee, the love interest in 'The General'?

Keaton hired her from the ranks of the Sennett Bathing Beauties.

Which director called 'The General' the greatest comedy, and perhaps film, ever made?

On release it got mixed reviews and mediocre box office, and Keaton was never again given total control of a film.

'The General' was among the first films chosen for the US National Film Registry in which inaugural year?

'Sherlock Jr.' followed in 1991 and 'Cops' in 1997.

How does Keaton survive the falling building facade in 'Steamboat Bill, Jr.' (1928)?

The prop weighed two tons and the window offered only a few inches of clearance around his body.

What natural disaster strikes the river town in the climax of 'Steamboat Bill, Jr.'?

The storm tears the walls off the hospital where Bill Jr. is lying, setting up the falling-facade gag.

'Steamboat Bill, Jr.' was Keaton's last picture for which distributor before he moved to MGM?

It was not a box-office success, which helped push him into the studio deal he later called his worst mistake.

Which 1928 film was Keaton's first under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer?

He later called the move to MGM 'the worst mistake of my career'.

Which two fellow comedians warned Keaton against signing with MGM, saying he would lose his independence?

Keaton signed anyway, partly because his recent independent films had underperformed.

Which studio head fired Keaton in 1933, ending his career as a leading man in features?

The final straw came when Keaton refused to report for a Saturday photo-op so he could serve as a college baseball mascot.

At MGM in the early 1930s Keaton was teamed in three talkies with which loud, rambunctious comic?

The films were 'Speak Easily', 'The Passionate Plumber' and 'What! No Beer?'.

What was the name of Keaton's first wife, a sister of film stars Norma and Constance?

They divorced in 1932 and she changed their two sons' surname to Talmadge.

What is the Beverly Hills mansion Keaton had built for $300,000 in 1926 commonly called?

He sold an earlier house to MGM executive Eddie Mannix at cost before commissioning it.

Keaton's third and final marriage, in 1940, was to an MGM dancer 23 years his junior; who was she?

The marriage stabilised his life, and she remained with him until his death.

What was Keaton's signature piece of headwear?

He made each one by cutting down a Stetson and stiffening the brim with sugar water.

Keaton appeared as one of the 'waxworks' bridge players in which 1950 Billy Wilder film?

He also cameoed in 'In the Good Old Summertime' (1949) and 'Around the World in 80 Days' (1956).

Keaton and Chaplin shared the screen as two inept stage musicians in which 1952 film?

Their routine recalled the vaudeville tricks of Keaton's short 'The Playhouse'.

Keaton received an Honorary Oscar for the year 1959; at which ceremony was it presented?

He has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for film and one for television.

Keaton's 1961 episode 'Once Upon a Time', mixing silent and sound, aired on which series?

He worked with Ernie Kovacs on a TV pilot the day before Kovacs died in a car crash in 1962.

Which Nobel-winning playwright wrote 'Film' (1965), his only screenplay, with Keaton in the central role?

The writer had wanted Charlie Chaplin or Zero Mostel first, and the shoot was his only visit to the United States.

In 'The Railrodder' (1965), made for Canada's National Film Board, Keaton crosses the country on what?

It was his final silent film, a 25-minute travelogue with no dialogue.

Keaton supplied comedy scenes in the mid-1960s for which teen-movie series?

He appeared in four, including 'Beach Blanket Bingo' and 'How to Stuff a Wild Bikini'.

Keaton's last major feature role, shot in Spain in 1965, was in which Richard Lester musical comedy?

He played the doddering Erronius; his very last appearance was in a Canadian construction-safety film.

Keaton's final screen appearance, 'The Scribe' (1966), was made for what purpose?

He died shortly after completing it.

Keaton died on February 1, 1966, aged 70, of what illness?

His widow said he was up playing cards with friends the day before he died.

Where is Buster Keaton buried?

He had lived and worked in Los Angeles since 1917.

Which critic wrote that Keaton's 'extraordinary period from 1920 to 1929' made him 'the greatest actor-director in the history of the movies'?

Entertainment Weekly ranked him the seventh-greatest film director in 1996.

Kevin Brownlow's acclaimed 1987 documentary series about the comedian is subtitled what?

Peter Bogdanovich made his own tribute, 'The Great Buster: A Celebration', in 2018.

In the 1930s Keaton made a comeback in two-reel shorts for which studio, becoming its top comedian?

'Grand Slam Opera' (1936), from his own screenplay, is considered the high point of the run.

From 1939 Keaton starred in two-reel comedies for which studio, which paid its short-subject comedians $500 a film?

The shorts were reissued to theatres in the late 1940s and again in the early 1960s.

Keaton summered from 1908 to 1916 at an 'Actors' Colony' in Bluffton, part of which Michigan city?

The city still holds a Buster Keaton convention run by fans known as the Damfinos.

Keaton's first starring feature was which 1920 film, based on the play 'The New Henrietta'?

The play had already been filmed once as 'The Lamb', with Douglas Fairbanks in the lead.

Keaton's 1923 directorial debut Three Ages parodies which D. W. Griffith epic?

It copies the film's structure of three inter-cut stories and also spoofs Bible tales such as Samson's.

Which actor played Keaton in the 1957 biopic The Buster Keaton Story?

Sidney Sheldon wrote and directed it; the script merged Keaton's three wives into one character.

The International Buster Keaton Society's members are nicknamed the 'Damfinos' after what?

The society was founded on 4 October 1992, Keaton's birthday.

Which comedy trio's last three MGM films did Keaton supply gags for as a writer?

The films were At the Circus, Go West and The Big Store, none a match for the brothers' earlier MGM work.

Which British actor found cans of Keaton's lost films, including The Boat, after buying his house?

Mason donated them to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences rather than hand them back.

How many of Keaton's films have been added to the US National Film Registry?

They are One Week, Cops, Sherlock Jr., The General, Steamboat Bill, Jr. and The Cameraman.

In 1960 Keaton toured as mute King Sextimus the Silent in which Broadway musical?

The role suited him: the king cannot speak for most of the show.

Which surrealist called Keaton's films 'pure poetry' and made the 1925 collage The Marriage of Buster Keaton?

Dalí's essay Film-arte, film-antiartístico held Keaton up as the model of 'anti-artistic' cinema.

Which Woody Allen film about a character stepping out of a movie was influenced by Sherlock Jr.?

Mel Brooks also borrowed the changing-room scene from The Cameraman for Silent Movie.

How many stars does Keaton have on the Hollywood Walk of Fame?

One is for motion pictures and one for television; the alley where he shot Cops is now Chaplin-Keaton-Lloyd Alley.

Keaton shot scenes for the TV pilot Medicine Man with which comedian the day before that comedian died?

Kovacs died in a car crash on 13 January 1962; the pilot was completed but never aired.