Mack Sennett

Mack Sennett was born Michael Sinnott on January 17, 1880 in Danville, Quebec, Canada, to Irish immigrant farmers. When he was 17, his parents moved the family to East Berlin, Connecticut, and he became a laborer at American Iron Works, a job he continued when they moved to Northampton, Massachusetts.

Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 986-992. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.

He happened to meet Marie Dressler in 1902, and through her went to New York City to attempt for a career on the stage. He managed some burlesque and chorus-boy parts.

In 1908, he began acting in Biograph films.

By 1910, he was directing.

His work there lasted until 1911; it included being directed by D. W. Griffith and acting with Mary Pickford and Mabel Normand.

In 1912, he and two bookies-turned-producers--Adam Kessel and Charles Bauman--formed the Keystone Film Company. Sennett brought Mabel Normand with him and soon added Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle, Chester Conklin Al St.

John, Slim Summerville, Minta Durfee and Charles Chaplin (who was directed by Sennett in 35 comedies during 1914). He told Chaplin, "We have no scenario--we get an idea, then follow the natural sequence of events until it leads up to a chase, which is the essence of our comedy. " To the slapstick chase gags of the Keystone Kops were gradually added the Bathing Beauties and the Kid Komedies.

In 1915 he, Griffith and Thomas H. Ince formed Triangle Films. Comedy moved from improvisational slapstick to scripted situations. Stars like Bobby Vernon and Gloria Swanson joined him.

In 1917, he formed Mack Sennett Comedies, distributing through Paramount--and later Pathe--and launching another star, Harry Langdon.

Co-founder/Treasurer of Associated Producers, Inc., formed in 1919.

Founder/President of Mack Sennett Productions, a production company, formed in 1922.

Oddly, he and key competitor Hal Roach, were both distributed by the same company, Pathe. This arrangement worked to the detriment of both producers while lining the pockets of the French firm, which was able to play the comedy short giants off each other for years. By the time Pathe's U.S. fortunes declined considerably in 1925, Sennett was in far worse shape than Roach, who had valuable reissue rights to Harold Lloyd's library, and the wildly popular "Our Gang" series gained him a lucrative distribution deal with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Lloyd, his former associate, jumped to Paramount). Sennett had far less to fall back on. Although he had a well-deserved reputation for discovering talent, being able to keep them under contract was another matter. His inability to hang on to major stars became the stuff of legend. Equally problematic, his comedy style was seriously outdated by the mid-'20s and his most promising recent star, Harry Langdon, quickly departed in an ego-driven rage. Sennett's studio would be sold off in a 1933 bankruptcy and morph into Herbert J. Yates' Republic Pictures (also see Nat Levine, W. Ray Johnston and Trem Carr). Sennett would essentially end his professional career as a producer for Paramount's shorts division, working on Bing Crosby's earliest efforts along with a handful of W.C. Fields' classic early talkie quickies. Sennett's treasured studio property is, as of this writing, the heart of CBS' Studio Center in the San Fernando Valley.

When Sennett returned to Paramount in 1932, he produced shorts featuring W. C. Fields and musical ones with Bing Crosby.

After directing his only Buster Keaton film, The Timid Young Man (1935), he returned to Canada a pauper.

In 1937, he was awarded a special Oscar--"to the master of fun, discoverer of stars. . . for his lasting contribution to the comedy technique of the screen.

Jerome Robbins honored Sennett by using his bathing beauties and Keystone Kops in The Bathing Beauty Ballet from the Broadway musical "High Button Shoes" in 1947, which in turn was caricatured by artist Al Hirschfeld with the title "The Mack Sennett Ballet".

He was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6710 Hollywood Blvd. on February 8, 1960.

Portrayed by Robert Preston in the Broadway musical "Mack and Mabel" (1974). Book by Michael Stewart, music and lyrics by Jerry Herman.

According to "The History of Sherlock Holmes" (E-GO Enterprises, c. 1975), Sennett played the role of Sherlock Holmes in 11 films from 1911-13.

He was posthumously awarded a star on Canada's Walk of Fame in Toronto, Ontario, in 2004.