The Hayseed
About The Hayseed
Buster runs the general store and post office while Fatty delivers the mail and plays hide-and-seek with Fanny on her farm. The constable, who also wants Fanny, steals an insured letter worth $300 and buys her a ring. Fatty gives her a more expensive one. At a dance Buster does magic and Fatty sings after eating onions, driving the room to tears. The constable frames Fatty for the theft. Buster exposes him, and Fatty's dog Luke chases the constable off. Fanny will not kiss Fatty until he tells her to eat onions too.
Cast & crew
More about The Hayseed
Roscoe Arbuckle directed and plays the mailman. Jean Havez wrote it. Joseph M. Schenck produced. Elgin Lessley photographed it. Paramount distributed the two-reeler. Buster Keaton plays the store manager. Molly Malone plays Fanny. John Henry Coogan Jr., credited as John Coogan, plays the constable. Luke the Dog runs the last chase.
Themes
Background
A Paramount two-reel comedy released in October 1919, near the end of the Arbuckle-Keaton series.
Making
Arbuckle directed and played the mailman, with Keaton running the store. Paramount released the two-reeler in the last year of their partnership.
Look
Elgin Lessley shot the farm, the store, and the dance hall, including the close gag of Fatty's onion breath hitting the dancers.
Notes
- The stolen letter is insured for $300.
- Keaton's magic turn at the dance is a straight specialty stuck inside the theft plot.
Scenes
- Fatty sings at the dance after eating onions, and the audience cries from the smell.
- Luke the Dog runs the constable out once Buster shows who took the letter.
