The Hogan Comedies: Silent Keystone Classics Starring Charlie Murray

Charles "Charlie" Murray was born in 1872 in Laurel, Indiana, the son of Irish immigrants. An unruly student, he left home at age 11 to work as a clown in the circus. There he befriended a fellow Irish performer, Ollie Mack. Dressed in rustic Gallic garb and mining their shared cultural background for humor, the two became a popular comedy duo called "Murray and Mack." Despite their popularity in vaudeville, Mack left show business for a career in advertising, leaving Murray to try his hand at Hollywood. He joined Mack Sennett's Keystone Film Company, and was assigned a character like the other actors in the director's troupe (Mack "Ambrose" Swain, Louise "Maggie" Fazenda, and of course Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle.) Charlie became "Hogan", an Irish country bumpkin much like the ones he played on stage. "The Sennett Studio was the king at developing new stars," according to John Carpenter, "and each one represented a part of the American melting pot. In Charlie Murray's case, he and (leading lady) Polly Moran represented the farcical side of the lower-class Irish that were newly immigrating to this country. These rare shorts show Keystone at its most violent and sexually themed. They entertained the mixed classes that flooded the nickelodeons and eventually, the theaters of America."

Includes:

• Hogan's Romance Upset
• Hogan, the Porter
• Caught in the Act
• The Beauty Bunglers
• Their Social Splash

BONUS: Bombs and Brides (1916): "Changing distributors, Sennettt got better funding which enabled him to put his stars in longer two-reel shorts like Bombs and Brides. Charlie Murray is no longer a new-to-this-country Irish stereotype as he stars alongside Edgar Kennedy, Louise Fazenda, Mary Thurman and (in a bit appearance) Al St. John."