David MacLeod

ROSCOE ARBUCKLE

Fatted Calf to Sacrificial Lamb

by

David MacLeod

Prsented in Iola Kansas, September 1996

A man stands in the dock of an American courtroom accused of a heinous

crime. But this is no ordinary man; this is an idol, a star loved by millions.

However, the vast majority of observers now think this former hero is

guilty, even before the jury has delivered its verdict. That opinion has

been formed, thanks to a media barrage that has turned the trial of the

century into a sorry circus.

Whatever happens, the defendant's career is in the balance. His

employers and many so-called friends have already deserted him over the

course of the trial. Proceedings that have been going on for many, many

months.

Finally, the jury delivers a verdict. They have been away a very short

time, indeed - a surprise to many. Their unanimous decision: not guilty.

The defendant may be innocent in the eyes of the law, but for some, that

legal judgement is irrelevant. They think they know better.

Does all this sound strangely familiar? I could have been talking about

a certain football hero-turned actor called O. J. Simpson, but I wasnÕt.

I was referring to one Roscoe Conkling Arbuckle, known to millions of

film fans as ÒFatty;Ó a rotund comedian adored by children and second

only to Chaplin in terms of popularity and wealth... until one fateful

day in 1921.

Arbuckle had completed six feature films which were making millions for

Paramount Pictures. He was now working on three more simultaneously,

going from scene to scene, set to set, costume to costume.

Arbuckle reckoned he had earned a break. So, he drove his Pierce Arrow

the 500 miles to San Francisco, took up residence in the St. Francis

Hotel and threw a party.

During the course of the festivities, a young actress, Virginia Rappé

became ill. Several days later, she died. A tragic event, certainly, and

not one likely to help the already shaky reputation Hollywood had in

many eyes. But the event exploded onto the front pages when Arbuckle

himself was arrested and charged with her murder.

September 11th, 1921 was described by Buster Keaton as the day all of the

laughter stopped.

The myths that have grown up about the events surrounding this sorry

affair are legion. Many people, if they have heard of Arbuckle at all,

will tell you he was that fat guy who raped and murdered some innocent

actress. Some will hint at more sordid details about burst bladders and

coke bottles.

Let us start then by debunking a few of these myths.

Firstly, although Arbuckle was arrested for murder, the charge was

changed to one of manslaughter almost immediately. There was never a

charge of rape.

Secondly, the accusation that led to ArbuckleÕs arrest was levelled by

one Maude Delmont. This notorious woman was known to procure girls for

parties and occasionally use them to blackmail some producer by

threatening to accuse him of rape.

But Delmont never actually gave evidence in any of ArbuckleÕs three

trials for a very simple reason; the Prosecution realised that she was

such an unreliable witness, whose story changed so often, that she could

only prejudice their case.

Thirdly, what of ÔinnocentÕ victim Virginia Rappé? The media and, more

recently, Kenneth Anger in his vitriolic "Hollywood Babylon" books,

tried to portray Miss Rappé as a sweet, fragile young thing. A precious

butterfly crushed by the bestial passions of a sex-crazed sadist.

In fact, Virginia Rapp was the illegitimate daughter of a chorus girl

and prostitute who died when Virginia was just 11.

Raised by her grandmother, Virginia had no fewer than five abortions

between the ages of 14 and 16, before giving birth to a baby girl whilst

still aged 16.

Virginia Rappé was little more than a good time girl with a minor acting

career, secured via the casting couch and her boyfriend, director Henry

"Pathe" Lehrman. She had been told by her doctors not to drink, so as not to aggravate a

chronic bladder infection, but she frequently did. Her behaviour, when

drunk, was alarming; she would often scream and tear her clothes off at

parties.

Moreover, this innocent young thing was suffering from gonorrhoea when

she died, not the first time she had been infected. If Arbuckle had

raped her, he would have contracted the disease. As he didnÕt, it led to

one of the most disgraceful and persistent myths surrounding the death

of Virginia Rapp; that Arbuckle ruptured the girlÕs bladder when raping

her with a bottle of some kind.

Not only is it anatomically improbable that the bladder could be

ruptured in this fashion, but a medical report - suppressed by the

Prosecution - found that Virginia Rappé had not been attacked in any

way.

But never let the facts get in the way of a good story. The press had a

field day. They printed everything; rumour, innuendo, outright lies,

anything to sell their papers.

Chief amongst these were the newspapers owned by William Randolph

Hearst, unwitting inspiration for Charles Foster Kane in Orson Welles'

masterpiece, "Citizen Kane."

Hearst once admitted that the Arbuckle case sold more papers than

anything since the sinking of the Lusitania.

In such a climate, Arbuckle didn't stand a chance.

The District Attorney of San Francisco, Matthew Brady saw a high profile

case like Arbuckle's as a step towards becoming Governor of California.

Riding the then-current moral backlash against Hollywood, a useful

conviction against one of the film colony's favourite sons would be a

significant feather in his political cap.

The press loved a juicy scandal and jumped on the bandwagon in a way

that would give us pause even today.

Worst of all, womenÕs groups and religious organisations helped to

create a public hostility towards Arbuckle that ensured that he was

considered guilty until proved innocent.

Even before the first of his three trials, ArbuckleÕs films were pulled

from many cinema screens throughout the world... just in case.

The popular misconceptions about the events of that fateful day are as

follows:

In a three-room suite at the St. Francis Hotel, Roscoe Arbuckle was

throwing a Labor Day party. It was Monday, September 5th, 1921.

Present that day were Arbuckle, director Fred Fischbach, actor Lowell

Sherman, dress salesman Ira Fortlouis, actress Virginia Rapp, her

manager Al Semnacher, their friend Maude Delmont and two showgirls; Zey

Prevon and Alice Blake.

All correct... so far. The following, however, is the gospel according

to Maude "Bambina" Delmont, known to some as Madam Black.

Virginia Rapp, having had just three drinks, confided in Maude that

Roscoe had made a pass at her in the bathroom of room 1219. Maude

shrugged it off.

Maude then danced with Sherman but noticed that Rappé and Arbuckle had

not been seen for some time. They were together in 1219. Maude was

unable to get an answer from Rapp and grew more and more concerned.

Semnacher and Fortlouis had now left, but the assembled guests suddenly

heard Rapp screaming in agony.

The assistant manager of the hotel was called and soon arrived to demand

that Arbuckle open the locked door. Arbuckle did so. He was wearing his

pyjamas and Virginia's Panama hat. With a foolish grin he simply uttered

"she's in there,"

Rappé was found on a bed, tearing at her clothes and screaming that she

was in pain. Maude Delmont, a former nurse, decided that Rappé should be

plunged into a cold bath.

This done, she was removed and taken down the hotel corridor to room

1227, where the hotel physician, Dr. Beardslee, attended to her.

He concluded that she was merely drunk, but administered two morphine

injections to help the pain. Maude stayed with the sick girl overnight.

The next morning, Dr. Beardslee returned, injected her again and

catheterised her. This suggested that Virginia had internal injuries.

Unhappy with Beardslee's attitude and lack of concern, Delmont called an

old friend, Dr. Rumwell. Although reluctant to take the case, it was

Rumwell who was the first to hear Delmont's accusation that Virginia had

been crushed by the weight of Arbuckle on top of her.

Despite having made no such statements herself, Virginia was supposedly

now lucid enough to confirm DelmontÕs claim.

Rumwell did eventually examine Rapp but told Delmont to simply order a

hot-water bottle and some medicine.

Delmont and a Nurse Jameson remained in a bedside vigil until Thursday,

when Rapp was moved to the Wakefield Sanatorium, where she died the

following afternoon.

That is the story and the "evidence" D.A. Matthew Brady initially

decided was enough to charge Arbuckle with murder.

By the time he had realised what a liability Delmont had become and what

a tissue of lies her account was, the wheels were already in motion. So,

Brady opted to go ahead with the conviction anyway and pursued Arbuckle

for eight long months.

THE FIRST TRIAL

At Roscoe Arbuckle's first trial -- begun on November the 14th 1921 -- Dr.

Beardslee, the hotel physician, was called as a Prosecution witness.

Matthew Brady was assisted by Milton U'Ren and Leo Friedman. It was

UÕRen who was careful to avoid any mention by Beardslee of Maude Delmont

or any of the conversation that had taken place.

Nevertheless, Beardslee did make a startling admission during

examination. He revealed that he had thought Rappés condition

sufficiently serious to warrant surgery. Nobody challenged him as to why

he had not carried out the procedure.

Matthew Brady knew that, with Maude Delmont's worthless testimony, he

needed some damning evidence from Zey Prevon and Alice Blake.

Unfortunately for him, neither of their initial statements contained

anything to point the finger at Arbuckle.

Brady decided that, of the two women, Zey Prevon would be easier to

"work on." However, despite threats and intensive questioning, she

refused to sign a statement stating that Rappé had said "I'm dying! I'm

dying! He killed me.Ó in the presence of Arbuckle. Even if Rappe had

made such a statement, it would have to have been said in Arbuckle's

presence to be admissible as evidence.

Alice Blake also refused to agree that Rappé had ever said "He killed

me" until the D.A's office threatened to take away Blake's illegitimate

child. She crumbled but still insisted that the line be changed to "he

hurt me."

When told of Alice Blake's capitulation, an exhausted Zey Prevon said,

"I never heard Virginia say it, but if you want me to say I did, I

will."

At the first trial, both women testified that Viginia had said "he hurt

me," but then weakened the Prosecution case by admitting that it had

been said after Virginia had been stripped and plunged into the ice-cold

bath. Under those circumstances, the statement -- if it had ever been

made -- could have referred to Fred Fischbach, who had carried the naked

Virginia into the bathroom and plunged her into the freezing water.

The Prosecution also trotted out several "witnesses," all trying to

portray Virginia Rapp as a clean-living, healthy young thing. But it

was the Defence who presented real evidence as to Miss Rappés

character.

Dr. Rumwell -- Maude Delmont's friend, remember -- testified that, not

only had Virginia never said anything to him that implicated Arbuckle,

he also was able to see that, whatever else she was suffering from,

Virginia did have gonnorhea.

Up until this admission, Virginia Rappé had actually been portrayed in

the press as a virgin.

Irene Morgan, a former housekeeper of Virginia RappÕs, testified that

Virginia had often had severe bouts of abdominal pain. The pattern was

always the same; agonised screams and tearing of the clothes.

The Prosecution demanded that this testimony be stricken from the

record. It was. But when asked about RappÕs behaviour after drinking,

Morgan was able to describe Virginia tearing off her clothes and

occasionally running out into the street naked, only to be brought back

into the house by Morgan.

Irene Morgan was later found poisoned in her hotel room. She recovered

but supposedly also received death threats for testifying in Arbuckle's

favour.

Despite resistance from some of his own lawyers, Roscoe Arbuckle himself

took the stand at 10:30 a.m. on November 28th. He testified for four

hours in total. All but 20 minutes of which were under the intense and

bullying questioning of assistant D. A. Friedman.

In spite of Leo FriedmanÕs hectoring and haranguing manner, Roscoe

Arbuckle quietly and calmly told his side of the story:

He had walked into the bathroom of room 1219 to find Virginia Rappé on

the floor in front of the toilet, where she had been vomiting. He had

then held her while she vomited again, before sitting her up and giving

her several glasses of water. He then summoned the other partygoers. By

the time they returned, Virginia was sitting on the edge of the bed in

room 1219, tearing at her clothes and screaming.

Later, he had an altercation with Maude Delmont, who was rubbing ice on

the sick girl. When Arbuckle asked why, Delmont told him to get out of

the room and leave her alone.

And that was it. The whole incident. The Prosecution knew that even

their own witnesses, in their pre-trial statements, had not been able to

establish that Arbuckle and Rapp had been alone together for more than

10 minutes. An impossibly short time for Arbuckle to have done the

things he was being accused of.

Friedman desperately tried to extend the timespan by questioning the

accuracy of the clock in ArbuckleÕs room, which Roscoe had noted twice

during the party. When it was established Ñ by Friedman himself Ñ that

the clock was electrically controlled, he quietly dropped that avenue.

At the end of an exhausting day, Arbuckle was applauded by the courtroom

spectators.

After closing arguments, the jury retired to consider its verdict, at

4.15pm on December the 2nd. The first ballot produced a 9-3 majority in

favour of acquittal. By 11pm, it was 11-1.The lone dissenter was one

Helen Hubbard, who refused to listen to any discussion on the case and

told her fellow jurors that she would vote guilty "until hell freezes

over." She also happened to be married to an attorney, who had dealings

with the offices of D. A. Matthew Brady.

After 44 hours, the jury went to the judge and told him they were

deadlocked. The jury was discharged and a second trial called for.

Hollywood had expected Arbuckle to be acquitted. When he was not, it

panicked: Friends deserted him; Adolph Zukor at Paramount did everything

in his power to distance himself from his former money spinner.

Within four days of the end of Arbuckle's first trial, 12 of the most

powerful producers in Hollywood asked Postmaster General, William H.

Hays to become Hollywood's censor -- for $100,000 a year for three years.

Hays accepted and ended up in the position for three decades. His task

was to make sure that Hollywood's film output was moral and decent, to

raise the standards and to re-establish its tarnished reputation.

THE SECOND TRIAL

Roscoe Arbuckle's second trial began on January 11th, 1922. Much of the

evidence was a straight rehash of the first trial. However, both Alice

Blake and Zey Prevon changed their stories. Blake now claimed not to

remember Virginia making any statement implicating Arbuckle. Prevon went

further and told of how the Prosecution had forced her to agree to the

damning statement.

Several more Defence witnesses recounted stories of Virginia Rappés

prediliction for taking her clothes off in public, including one

incident just two days before the fateful party.

Everything seemed to be looking good for the Defence, until they made

two serious errors.

Firstly, they opted not to put Arbuckle on the stand,claiming that

duplication of his testimony was pointless, forgetting that this jury

would be hearing his story for the first time. Arbuckle had been so

impressive at his first trial, thereÕs no reason to doubt that he would

have been just as effective again.

More serious, was Arbuckle's chief lawyer, Gavin McNab's decision not to

make a closing argument.

He believed that the case was so clear cut in his favour that the jury

would find Arbuckle innocent without the need for a final speech.

In fact, many of the jurors took this as an admission of guilt and the

first ballot produced a 9-3 majority in favour of conviction. Soon, the

count was 10-2.

Of the two in favour of acquittal, one, Clem Brownsberger offered to

change his vote if the other would. Luckily for Arbuckle, Lee Dolson was

as adamant as Helen Hubbard had been.

On February 3rd, a second deadlocked jury was dismissed and yet another

trial was called for.

THE THIRD TRIAL

The third trial got underway on March 13th, 1922. The Defence knew there

was no room for complacency. Gavin McNab's cross-examination of Alice

Blake was so intense that she collapsed on the stand. Arbuckle told his

story again and the Prosecution blundered when they insisted on details

of Virginia Rappés early life being made public.

McNab's closing speech was meticulous, as he ridiculed the state's case

point by point. It worked... and how.

At 5:10 on April 12th, the jury retired to consider its verdict. Five

minutes later, they returned. A standing vote had been unanimous in

favour of acquittal. The five minutes had been spent composing a

remarkable statement which the jury foreman asked to read out in full.

"Acquittal is not enough for Roscoe Arbuckle. We feel that a great

injustice has been done him. We feel also that it was only our plain duty

to give him his exoneration, under the evidence, for there was not the

slightest proof adduced to connect him in any way with the commision of

a crime."

"He was manly throughout the case, and told a straight forward story on

the witness stand, which we all believed."

"The happening at the hotel was an unfortunate affair for which

Arbuckle, so the evidence shows, was in no way responsible."

"We wish him success, and hope that the American people will take the

judgement of fourteen men and women who have sat listening for

thirty-one days to the evidence, that Roscoe Arbuckle is entirely

innocent and free from blame."

AFTERMATH

It had been seven months since the Labor Day party and Arbuckle had been

totally exonerated. Asked about his future plans, he said, "...after the

quick vindication that I have received today, I am sure the Americans

will be fair and just."

In the immediate aftermath, they were. ArbuckleÕs features played to

packed houses throughout the country. Hollywood fell over itself to

welcome Roscoe back to the fold, including Viola Dana and Buster Keaton,

both of whom had asked to appear as character witnesses for their friend

but been denied.

April 12th, 1922 looked as if it was going to be the first day of the

rest of Arbuckle's life.

On April 18th, William H. Hays banned Roscoe Arbuckle from the screen.

Or so it was always thought.

In fact, the decision was made by Arbuckle's employers at Paramount,

Adolph Zukor and Jesse Lasky. Guilty or innocent, they assumed that

Arbuckle would be box-office poison and decided to cut their not

inconsiderable losses. However, realising the outcry in Hollywood if

they were seen to be effectively ending Roscoe's career, Zukor persuaded

the newly-installed Hays to be the hatchet man. A rather naive Hays

agreed.

WILDERNESS

So began Roscoe Arbuckle's nine years in the wilderness -- unable to use

his real name -- working as gag writer or director, without credit,

occasionally using the pseudonym William Goodrich. His great friend

Buster Keaton had suggested the name Will B. Good, but laughter was

pretty thin on the ground for a broken man.

Eventually, in 1932, Hollywood's scapegoat was allowed to appear in

front of the camera again, legally, in a series of six shorts.

I am actually proud to have copies of all six of these films in my video

collection. They are a little old-fashioned, the budgets were not

lavish, but seeing Arbuckle, just as lively and, remarkably, unchanged

is a treat. The shock is hearing the deep, rich voice that so impressed

two of his three juries, booming out of his large frame.

Sadly, the comeback was short lived. On the eve of signing a feature

contract, RoscoeÕs 46-year-old heart gave out. It was in the early hours

of June the 29th, 1933.

Roscoe Arbuckle was a great comedian. A unique screen personality, an

inspired clown and an under-rated writer and director.

(Our Hero) Buster Keaton '' rightly lauded as one of the greatest

comedians and comedy directors in cinema history '' claimed that

everything he knew about filmmaking he had learned from Arbuckle. But

even 60 years after his death and three-quarter's of a century after

that notorious party, few people seem to care.

Many of his films have now been lost forever, but not for the usual

reasons of decomposition or neglect; many of his pre-1917 films made for

Mack Sennett at Keystone survive and most -- though sadly still not all Ñ

of the Comique shorts he made at Paramount with Buster Keaton and Al St.

John between 1917 and 1920 still exist.

But of the nine features he made in that hectic period between December

1919 and August 1921, only one, "Leap Year," is easily accessible.

Others exist but are rarely, if ever, shown. The rest were quietly and

systematically disposed of. The legacy of a great comedian consigned to

the flames.

If you read David YallopÕs superb book on Arbuckle, "The Day The

Laughter Stopped" -- and I strongly urge you to do so -- it should become

perfectly clear that Arbuckle's only "crime" was being nice to a sick

girl at a party.

His career was destroyed by a cowardly Hollywood, a shameful gutter

press and the political ambitions of a city official. Utterly futile

ambitions, as it turned out; Matthew Brady never did become the Governor

of California... good!

So, does the Arbuckle story matter? Does injustice matter? Does Dreyfus,

the McCarthy witch-hunts, the blacklist matter?

They do to me and I hope to you. The sooner the reputation of Roscoe

Arbuckle is rescued from the ill-informed the better... before it is too

late.

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