Harry Watson Jr. | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Watson Jr. in 1912 | |
| Born | Harry B. Watson Jr. June 12, 1876 Saginaw, Michigan, U.S. |
| Died | September 23, 1930 (aged 54) Monrovia, California, U.S. |
| Occupations |
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| Years active | 1910–1930 |
Harry Watson Jr. (June 12, 1876 – September 23, 1930)[1], also known as Harry B. Watson, was an American actor and comedian. Before his Vaudeville, Broadway and film careers, he was a clown for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Among his Broadway shows were the musical Tip-Toes and five editions of the Ziegfeld Follies.
The highest-profile of Watson's few feature films were with Marion Davies and silent film star Harrison Ford: Little Old New York and Zander the Great,[2] two of his three Hearst Cosmopolitan Productions. But Watson is perhaps best recalled today as the star of a series of bizarre silent comedy shorts, The Mishaps of Musty Suffer.[3]
That Mr. Harry Watson Jr., is one of the finest comic artists of the American stage is demonstrated anew with each successive year. An alumnus of the same burlesque troupe that graduated that other excellent comedian, Mr. George Bickel, Watson's authentic talents, like those of his colleague, have long been overlooked — or if not entirely overlooked, greatly disparaged — by annalists of the stage who vouchsafe to low comedy merely a casual and then grudged attention. Yet the fact doubtless remains that this Watson is an actor of uncommon quality, not a mere slapstick pantaloon, an assaulter of trousers' seats, a professor of the bladder, but a mimic of exceptional capacity, a pantomimist of the very first grade and a comedian of real histrionic parts..
— George Jean Nathan, Comedians All[4]
Two volumes of surviving Musty Suffer titles—many featuring Watson's comedy partner, George Bickel—were restored by the American Library of Congress and released with music by Ben Model on DVD by Undercrank Productions in 2014 and 2015.[5]
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