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This Pimple comedy is a parody of the stage spectacular racing drama The
Whip, a famous Drury Lane production written by Cecil Raleigh and Henry
Hamilton, which featured at its climax an actual on-stage horse race, as well as
a realistically portrayed rail crash. The play was also filmed by Maurice
Tourneur in the USA in 1917. In this version, the Evans brothers make a virtue
of necessity and play up the cheapness of the production for all they are worth.
The train crash scene exploits the cardboard sets and incompetent stage hand to
hilarious effect, and the race of pantomime horses (some with only one man
inside) is splendid. You would describe this comedy as Pythonesque if it were
not separated from Monty Python's Flying Circus (BBC, 1969-74) by half a century.
Bryony Dixon
NOTE: An extract from this film is featured as part of 'How They Laughed', Paul Merton's interactive guide to early British silent comedy. Note that this material is not limited to users in registered UK libraries and educational establishments: it can be accessed by anyone, anywhere.
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Complete film (21:34)
