Slapstick Comedy & Its Cast Of Film Stars Has Long Been Viewed As Central To The Early Formal Development Of Narrative Cinema Generally, & Of American Cinema In Particular. This Volume Presents 14 Essays Exploring The Enduring Debates & Questions Surrounding Slapstick's Role In The Origins Of Cinema, As Well As Its Place In Movies Today. Introduction: Restoring Slapstick To The Historiography Of American Film / Tom Paulus And Rob King -- Originality And Adaptation. The Good Thieves: On The Origins Of Situation Comedy In The British Music Hall / Bryony Dixon; D.w. Griffith Shapes Slapstick / Barry Salt; Genre Parody And Comedic Burlesque: Keystone's Meta-cinematic Satires / Simon Joyce; Both Sides Of The Camera: Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle's Evolution At Keystone / Joanna E. Rapf; Mud Pies And Tears: Little Mary's Funny Side / Anke Brouwers -- Mechanics And Modernity. Mack Sennett Vs. Henry Ford / Eileen Bowser; Uproarious Inventions: The Keystone Film Company, Modernity, And The Art Of The Motor / Rob King; Mechanisms Of Laughter: The Devices Of Slapstick / Tom Gunning; Slapstick Skyscrapers: An Architecture Of Attractions / Steven Jacobs; California Slapstick Revisited / Charles Wolfe -- Bodies And Performance. Dancing Of Fire And Water: Charlot And L'esprit Nouveau / Amy Sargeant; Splashes Of Fun And Beauty: Mack Sennett's Bathing Beauties / Hilde D'haeyere; Back To The Slap: Slapstick's Hyperbolic Gesture And The Rhetoric Of Violence / Muriel Andrin; The Art Of Imitation: The Originality Of Charlie Chaplin And Other Moving-image Myths / Jennifer M. Bean. Edited By Tom Paulus And Rob King. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 258-261) And Index.