Two AM; or, The Husband's Return

1896 Drama 1 minute

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About Two AM; or, The Husband's Return

A husband comes home drunk at two in the morning and wakes his wife. She scolds him, works his clothes off, and tries to get him into bed. Paul Clerget plays the husband. Ethel Ross-Selwicke plays the wife.

Cast & crew

More about Two AM; or, The Husband's Return

Robert W. Paul produced the British comedy. Paul Clerget wrote it as well as playing the husband. Michael Brooke of BFI Screenonline writes that it was almost certainly taken from a stage piece then in performance. The action is a single bedroom scene.

Themes

Making

Clerget, a stage actor, supplied the script and the husband's part. Paul released the short in August 1896.

Preservation

A print survives and is on Wikimedia Commons.

Notes

  • The surviving copy runs 1 minute 8 seconds.
  • Brooke calls it a study in risqué body language: the husband is the worse for drink, and the wife is determined both to remonstrate and to undress him.
  • It is a Robert W. Paul production, not an Edison or American Mutoscope film.
  • A print is on Wikimedia Commons.

Scenes

  • The husband staggers in at two and his wife starts pulling his clothes off.

Influenced by

  • A concurrent stage sketch

Also available

  • Wikimedia Commons (Two AM; or, The Husband's Return.webm)