Mr. Toots' Tooth
About Mr. Toots' Tooth
Mr. Toots has a jumping toothache and starts for the dentist every time it jumps. Near the chair it eases, so he never sits. Advice does nothing. The office ties the tooth to a string with a heavy book on the other end. He will not let them throw the book out the window. He gets angry, throws the book at them, and the tooth comes out. Frank A. Lyons plays Toots. Arthur Housman wrote the farce and is in the cast, not in the lead.
Cast & crew
More about Mr. Toots' Tooth
Charles M. Seay directed. Edison released it as a split reel with the documentary Damascus and the Ruins of Baalbek. The Moving Picture World noticed it on 18 October 1913. A listed running time is 6 minutes. Edward Boulden, William Bechtel, and Alice Washburn are billed. A Commons copy comes from EYE Filmmuseum, inventory FLM44279.
Themes
Making
Seay’s gag is one prop: string, tooth, book. The throw is an accident of temper, which is why the World called the cure unexpected.
Reviews
The Moving Picture World, 18 October 1913, said spectators laughed and that more might have been got out of Housman’s farce. It credited the subtitles.
Music
Silent.
Preservation
A print survives at EYE Filmmuseum.
Notes
- The World said the subtitles help, and that the audience laughed at the way the molar finally goes.
- The pain stops whenever he gets close to the dentist’s chair.
- The partner on the reel is a travel film of Damascus and Baalbek, not another comedy.
- Housman is the writer. Lyons is Toots.
Scenes
- He reaches the chair and the pain stops.
- The office ties the tooth to a book.
- He hurls the book at the staff and the tooth follows.
Also available
- Wikimedia Commons (Mr. Toots' Tooth - Charles M. Seay - 1913, Edison Manufacturing Company - EYE FLM44279 - OB 685538.webm)
