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The L-KO Kompany, or L-KO Komedies, was an American motion picture company founded by Henry Lehrman that produced silent one-, two- and very occasionally three-reel comedy shorts between 1914 and 1919. The initials L-KO stand for "Lehrman KnockOut".
By the spring of 1914, Henry "Pathé" Lehrman had directed several important Keystone Cops comedies including The Bangville Police (1913) and Kid Auto Races at Venice (1914), Charlie Chaplin's debut. Wooed away from Mack Sennett by producer Fred J. Balshofer, [1] Lehrman left Keystone, along with star performer Ford Sterling, to found Sterling Comedies under the umbrella of the Universal Film and Manufacturing Co., later Universal Pictures. After a relatively short time, Lehrman was fired from Sterling Comedies and founded L-KO as a separate unit within Universal.
L-KO's first comedy star was veteran English comic Billie Ritchie, who had played the role of the drunk in Fred Karno's stage production A Night in the English Music Hall before Chaplin did. Ritchie made his film debut in the first L-KO production, Love and Surgery , which was released October 25, 1914. Also making their first films in this venture were Gertrude Selby, a comedian who became the main female foil in L-KO comedies, and Fatty Voss, L-KO's answer to Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. Louise Orth, who had appeared in some Biograph comedies and would go on to appear in many L-KO's, was also aboard for the first release. Before long this group of performers was joined by Hank Mann [2] and other disaffected talent from Mack Sennett's "fun factory," such as Alice Howell, Harry Gribbon and ultimately Mack Swain, whose "Ambrose" character continued at L-KO for a time. Henry Bergman had made one picture with Phillips Smalley before turning up at L-KO; not long after he would join Charlie Chaplin's regular troupe of character actors.
Lehrman proved even more frugal with budget than Sennett had been, and he favored a rough-and-tumble style of slapstick that reputedly resulted in injury. Author Kalton C. Lahue reported that there were stunt persons and bit players of the time who would not answer a call from L-KO owing to the possibility of danger; [3] stuntman Harvey Parry referred to him as '"Suicide" Lehrman.' [4] Lehrman eventually brought on directors John G. Blystone, Harry Edwards and David Kirkland to help raise the total output of L-KO, but stingily refused to award directors credit for L-KO films.
As the result of yet another dispute—this time with executives at Universal—Lehrman left L-KO towards the end of 1916 and took over the Sunshine Comedies unit at Fox. After Lehrman's departure, L-KO was taken over by Julius and Abe Stern -- brothers-in-law to Universal's founder Carl Laemmle -- and they named John G. Blystone director-in-chief. [5] Blystone headed L-KO for a few months but he ultimately went to Fox Sunshine as well. L-KO nonetheless kept going for quite some time and proved a valuable training ground for new or developing comedy talent. Director Charles Parrott, better known as Charley Chase, came onto the L-KO lot in August 1918 and directed a few subjects through to near the end of L-KO's existence. Dapper comic Raymond Griffith made his film debut at L-KO in 1915 and comedian Eva Novak did so in 1917. Even Fatty Voss managed to direct one two-reeler, Fatty's Feature Fillum , just before his untimely death in 1917. He, thus, spent his entire film career at L-KO.
What finally brought around the end of L-KO was not Lehrman's departure, nor declining receipts for L-KO's product, but an outbreak of Spanish flu on the lot, which forced Universal to shut the whole studio down. L-KO's last release, An Oriental Romeo (1919) starring Chinese funnyman Chai Hong, was released on September 24, 1919, though the studio had already been closed for good in May.
While L-KO never had a break-out star as prominent as Charlie Chaplin, in nearly every other way it was successful in competing with Keystone; moreover, as Mack Sennett broke with the Triangle Film Corporation in July, 1917, L-KO managed to outlast Keystone by a year. However, it remains an extremely obscure Silent Comedy brand. Although L-KO produced around 300 titles in its five-year existence; little more than 10 percent of these films are known to exist today. Given Lehrman's preference for violent sight gags and Ritchie's confrontational style of humor, surviving L-KO films stand as some of the edgiest and darkest entries in the annals of American Silent Comedy.
| Title | Release Date | Director | Star | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Love and Surgery | 1914 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| Partners in Crime | 1914 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| The Baron's Bear Escape | 1914 | Henry Bergman | ||
| Cupid in a Hospital | 1915 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| Every Inch a Hero | 1915 | Henry Lehrman | ||
| Almost a Scandal | 1915 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| Poor Policy | 1915 | Harry Edwards | Billie Ritchie | |
| Love and Sour Notes | 1915 | John G. Blystone | Billie Ritchie | |
| The Child Needs a Mother | 1915 | John G. Blystone | Fatty Voss | |
| Vendetta in a Hospital | 1915 | Billie Ritchie | ||
| Silk Hose and High Pressure | 1915 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| No Flirting Allowed | 1915 | Hank Mann | ||
| A Tale of Twenty Stories | 1915 | Vin Moore | Billie Ritchie | fragment only |
| Sin on the Sabbath | 1915 | Billie Ritchie | ||
| A Stool Pigeon's Revenge | 1916 | John G. Blystone | Hank Mann | |
| Gertie's Gasoline Glide | 1916 | Gertrude Selby | ||
| Billie's Waterloo | 1916 | Billie Ritchie | ||
| Cold Hearts and Hot Flames | 1916 | John G. Blystone | Billie Ritchie | |
| Live Wires and Love Sparks | 1916 | Henry Lehrman | Billie Ritchie | |
| Bombs and Bandits | 1917 | Vin Moore | Billy Bevan | |
| The Sign of the Cucumber | 1917 | Richard Smith | Eva Novak | |
| Soapsuds and Sirens | 1917 | Noel M. Smith | Harry Lorraine | |
| The Belles of Liberty | 1917 | James D. Davis | Eva Novak | |
| All Jazzed Up | 1917 | William Watson | Eva Novak | |
| Adventurous Ambrose | 1918 | Walter S. Fredericks | Mack Swain | |
| The King of the Kitchen | 1918 | Frank Griffin | Harry Gribbon | |
| Charlie, the Little Daredevil | 1919 | Alfred J. Goulding | Chai Hong | |
| The Freckled Fish | 1919 | Joseph Le Brandt | Chai Hong | fragment only |
The Keystone Cops are fictional, humorously incompetent policemen featured in silent film slapstick comedies produced by Mack Sennett for his Keystone Film Company between 1912 and 1917.
Mack Sennett was a Canadian-American producer, director, actor, and studio head who was known as the "King of Comedy" during his career.
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Keystone Studios was an early film studio founded in Edendale, California on July 4, 1912 as the Keystone Pictures Studio by Mack Sennett with backing from actor-writer Adam Kessel (1866–1946) and Charles O. Baumann (1874–1931), owners of the New York Motion Picture Company. The company, referred to at its office as The Keystone Film Company, filmed in and around Glendale and Silver Lake, Los Angeles for several years, and its films were distributed by the Mutual Film Corporation between 1912 and 1915. The Keystone film brand declined rapidly after Sennett went independent in 1917.
Mack Swain was a prolific early American film actor, who appeared in many of Mack Sennett’s comedies at Keystone Studios, including the Keystone Cops series. He also appeared in major features by Charlie Chaplin and starred in both the world's first feature length comedy and first film to feature a "movie-within-a-movie" premise.
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Henry Lehrman was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. Lehrman was a very prominent figure of Hollywood's silent film era, working with such cinematic pioneers as D. W. Griffith and Mack Sennett. He directed, as well as co-starred in, Charlie Chaplin's first film, Making a Living.
The Knockout is a 1914 American silent comedy film starring Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle. It also features Charlie Chaplin in a small role, his seventeenth film for Keystone Studios. It is one of only a few films in which Chaplin's Little Tramp character appears in a secondary role, not appearing until the second half of the film. It also stars Arbuckle's wife, Minta Durfee, Edgar Kennedy and Keystone owner, Mack Sennett in a minor role as a spectator. The film was directed by Charles Avery.
Edendale is a historical name for a district in Los Angeles, California, northwest of Downtown Los Angeles, in what is known today as Echo Park, Los Feliz and Silver Lake. In the opening decades of the 20th century, in the era of silent movies, Edendale was known as the home of most major movie studios on the West Coast. Among its many claims, it was home to the Keystone Cops, and the site of many movie firsts, including Charlie Chaplin's first movie, the first feature-length comedy, and the first pie-in-the-face. The Edendale movie studios were mostly concentrated in a four-block stretch of Allesandro Street, between Berkeley Avenue and Duane Street. Allesandro Street was later renamed Glendale Boulevard.
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Tango Tangles is a 1914 American film comedy short starring Charles Chaplin and Roscoe Arbuckle. The action takes place in a dance hall, with a drunken Chaplin, Ford Sterling, and the huge, menacing, and acrobatic Arbuckle fighting over a girl. The supporting cast also features Chester Conklin and Minta Durfee. The picture was written, directed and produced by Mack Sennett for Keystone Studios and distributed by Mutual Film Corporation.
In the Clutches of the Gang is a 1914 American short comedy film featuring Roscoe Arbuckle and the Keystone Cops. The majority of the film is believed to be lost. However, a fragment of the film exists and is held by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. This film is considered to be a "high point" for the Keystone Cops, as the entire movie focuses on the slapstick police force.
A Thief Catcher is a one-reel 1914 American comedy film, produced by Mack Sennett for his Keystone film company, directed by Ford Sterling, and starring Sterling, Mack Swain, Edgar Kennedy, and Charles Chaplin as a Keystone Cop.
Richard Smith, also known as Dick Smith, was a screenwriter, actor, and film director. Smith was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and became a comedian active in the vaudeville era. He met his wife Alice Howell in 1910 and the two performed together as Howell and Howell. After working under direction of Mack Sennett at the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company in New York City, Smith moved to Los Angeles, California. Smith and his wife starred in reels together produced by L-KO Kompany.
Al St. John (1893–1963) was an American comic actor who appeared in 394 films between 1913 and 1952. Starting at Mack Sennett's Keystone Film Company, St. John rose through the ranks to become one of the major comedy stars of the 1920s, though less than half of his starring roles still survive today. With the advent of sound drastically changing and curtailing the two-reel comedy format, St. John diversified, creating a second career for himself as a comic sidekick in Western films and ultimately developing the character of "Fuzzy Q. Jones", for which he is best known in posterity.
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Peggy Pearce was an American film actress of the silent era. She worked primarily in short subjects at the L-KO Kompany and Keystone Studios. She appeared alongside stars including Charles Chaplin, Roscoe Arbuckle, Billie Ritchie, Slim Summerville, Ford Sterling, and Mabel Normand.
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