Although Arbuckle was able to keep his leg, he was prescribed morphine against the pain; he would later be accused of being addicted to it. On April 18, 1922, Will Hays, the president of the new organization, banned Arbuckle from filmmaking. Around 3 o'clock, Arbuckle retired from the party in order to get dressed to go sight-seeing with a friend. After the reading of the apology statement, the jury foreman personally handed the statement to Arbuckle, who kept it as a treasured memento for the rest of his life. However, since many of Lehrman's films are lost, the exact number of roles she performed for him cannot be determined. He also said: "The American nation prides itself upon its spirit of fair play. Show More. Although that ban was later lifted, the actor remained blacklisted unofficially. Hubbard's husband was a lawyer who did business with the D.A. In Good Company While at Universal, Arbuckle worked under comedy pioneer Mack Sennett. Virtually the only indisputable facts seem to be that on September 5, 1921, there was a party at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco where alcohol was in abundance (despite Prohibition laws) and that both Arbuckle, then age 33, and a woman named Virginia Rappe were in attendance. Arbuckle allegedly co-directed scenes in Keaton's Sherlock Jr. (1924), but it is unclear how much of this footage remained in the film's final cut. Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle surrenders to Detective J.D. Fatty Arbuckle began his film career the Selig Polyscope Company. The public reaction to Arbuckle was fierce. 15,645 were here. He was one of the all-time greats.". However, some jurors interpreted the refusal to let Arbuckle testify as a sign of guilt. Rappe was not hospitalized until two days after the incident.[3]. His chief accuser, Bambina Maude Delmont, was a convicted criminal who had admitted plotting to extort money from him. [50], For his contributions to the film industry, in 1960, some 27 years after his death, Arbuckle was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 6701 Hollywood Boulevard. Arbuckle answered the door wearing his foolish screen smile and Virginia Rappe was on the bed, naked and moaning in pain. But when Arbuckle left the room, Rappe remained lying on the bed writhing in pain. Four days later, she was dead of a ruptured bladder. He suffered a heart attack later that night and died in his sleep. He later worked as a film director under the pseudonym William Goodrich. Working mostly in bit parts, Rappe died after attending a party with actor Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle, who was accused of manslaughter and rape in connection with her death, though he was ultimately acquitted of both charges. What happened in the following ten minutes is disputed. "The "Fatty" Arbuckle Scandal." Photo: Courtesy Everett Collection. Publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst gleefully noted that the scandal had sold more papers than the sinking of the Lusitania. By the time Arbuckle went to trial for manslaughter, his public reputation was already ruined. Truly exotic conditions, such as tuberculous cystitis weren't mentioned during the three trials. [26], Among the more visible directorial projects under the Goodrich pseudonym was the Eddie Cantor feature Special Delivery (1927), which was released by Paramount and co-starred William Powell and Jobyna Ralston. Delmont then told police that Arbuckle had raped Rappe; the police concluded that the impact of Arbuckle's overweight body lying on top of Rappe had eventually caused her bladder to rupture. Following Rappe's death, rumors arose, supposedly to besmirch her character, that she had given birth in Chicago in 1918 and put the baby in foster care. Minta Durfee, the actress who was married to Roscoe (Fatty) Arbuckle and became Charlie Chaplin's first motionpicture leading lady, died Tuesday in Woodland Hills, a Los Angeles suburb. Good". Wikipedia, 25 Jan. 2012. Although Comique produced some of the best short pictures of the silent era, Arbuckle transferred his controlling interest in the company to Buster Keaton in 1918 and accepted Paramount's $3million offer to make up to 18 feature films over three years. It was a double tragedy.". Skully after being charged with the murder of Virginia Rappe, San Francisco, 1921. Another partygoer soon accused Fatty Arbuckle of raping and killing her and he was tried three different times for those crimes. At a raucous, three-day party in September 1921, a young starlet became severely ill and died four days later. A second Fatty Arbuckle's restaurant was opened in Bournemouth in 1985. Arbuckle appeared alongside Keaton, Harold Lloyd, Rudolph Valentino, Douglas Fairbanks, and Jackie Coogan. With the scandal as front-page news on almost every newspaper, it was difficult to get an unbiased jury. Though Hays lifted the ban in December of the same year, the damage was done -- Arbuckle's career had been destroyed. [52], The James Ivory film The Wild Party (1975) has been repeatedly but incorrectly cited as a film dramatization of the ArbuckleRappe scandal. During the deliberations, some jurors joined Hubbard in voting to convict, but they all recanted except for Thomas Kilkenny. Wikimedia CommonsOne of the rooms occupied by Arbuckle and his guests in the days after the infamous party. "[27] Buster Keaton reportedly did make one public statement in support of Arbuckle's innocence, a decision which earned him a mild reprimand from the studio where he worked. He was simple, direct, and unflustered in both direct and cross-examination. [3], On November 28, Arbuckle testified as the defense's final witness. He appeared sporadically in Selig one-reelers until 1913, moved briefly to Universal Pictures, and became a star in producer-director Mack Sennett's Keystone Cops comedies. Keaton attempted to help Arbuckle by giving him work on his films. Among the guests was Virginia Rappe, a 30-year-old struggling actress who suffered from chronic cystitis, a bladder inflammation. Girls win big. [9][10] He then joined the Pantages Theatre Group touring the West Coast and in 1906 played the Orpheum Theater in Portland, Oregon, in a vaudeville troupe organized by Leon Errol. [6], In 1904, Sid Grauman invited Arbuckle to sing in his new Unique Theater in San Francisco, beginning a long friendship between the two. And it emerged in court that the prosecution had used intimidation to force several witnesses to testify against Arbuckle. In fact, witnesses testified that Arbuckle rubbed the ice on Rappe's stomach to ease her abdominal pain. When Arbuckle portrayed a female, the character was named "Miss Fatty", as in the film Miss Fatty's Seaside Lovers. Balshofer hired her again to costar with early drag performer Julian Eltinge and newcomer Rudolph Valentino in Over the Rhine, for which she was awarded the title of "Best Dressed Girl in Pictures". Fatty Arbuckle was born "Roscoe Conkling Arbuckle" in 1887. He saw the crook emerging from the wings and somersaulted into the orchestra pit in obvious panic. Brady at first used Delmont as his star witness during the indictment hearing. About the collections in Calisphere. [35] The divorce was granted the following January. Virginia Rappe died the following day from peritonitis, caused by a ruptured bladder. These rumors were proven false by autopsy. The media had a field day with the story . Arbuckle's lawyers found physicians in San Francisco for authority and physicians in Chicago who would state for the record that they treated or may have treated Virginia Rappe between 1908 and 1914. Public feeling was so negative that Durfee was later shot at while entering the courthouse. During the party one of the guests, Virginia Rappe, an aspiring actress, was found seriously ill in room 1219, the room in which Arbuckle was to stay. [48] That night he went out with friends to celebrate his first wedding anniversary and the new Warner Bros. contract when he reportedly said: "This is the best day of my life." Arbuckle was one of the most famous actors in world at the time, second only to Charlie Chaplin. Video, 'Trump or bust' - grassroots Republicans are still loyal, Alex Murdaugh jailed for life for double murder, AOC under investigation for Met Gala dress, Mother who killed her five children euthanised, Ukraine repels 'numerous attacks' in Bakhmut, Zoom boss Greg Tomb fired without cause, The children left behind in Cuba's exodus, Biden had skin cancer lesion removed - White House, US sues Exxon over nooses found at Louisiana plant. Arbuckle wrote the story for a Keaton short called Day Dreams (1922). The same evidence was presented, but this time one of the witnesses, Zey Prevon, testified that Brady had forced her to lie. In one of the first major Hollywood scandals, the beloved and overweight film star "Fatty" Arbuckle is accused of raping and murdering Virginia Rappe. At the behest of Adolph Zukor, president of Famous Players-Lasky, his films were banned by motion picture industry censor Will H. Hays[1] after the trial, and he was publicly ostracized. A medical examination found no evidence of sexual assault. The earliest known pie thrown in film was in the June 1913 Keystone one-reeler A Noise from the Deep, starring Arbuckle and frequent screen partner Mabel Normand. Read about our approach to external linking. [14] Witnesses also testified that Rappe had previously suffered from venereal disease, so there were allegations that her death was brought on by her health rather than by an assault.[13]. Dear Mick: You state, regarding the Fatty Arbuckle alleged rape-murder incident, "That crime never happened." However, since you were not there, you can't truthfully say it "never happened." The first two trials ended in hung juries, indicating that the evidence was not open and shut. He moved gracefully, threw pies, and humorously tumbled. [citation needed] In December of the same year, under public pressure, Hays elected to lift the ban. The story was fueled by yellow journalism, with the newspapers portraying Arbuckle as a gross lecher who used his weight to overpower innocent girls. However, his father no longer encouraged his acting when his mother passed away. At the hospital, Rappe's companion at the party, Bambina Maude Delmont, told a doctor that Arbuckle had raped her friend. Posters for his movies billed the 266-pound comedian as worth his weight in laughs. But before the year was out, he was accused of a crime so monstrous that he would never appear onscreen again. He retreated into alcoholism. Read about our approach to external linking. Virginia Rappe was born in Chicago in 1891 to Mabel Rapp, who died when Virginia was 11. [51], Neil Sedaka references Arbuckle, along with Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Stan Laurel, and Oliver Hardy in his 1971 song "Silent Movies", as heard on his Emergence album. Roscoe Conkling Arbuckle was born in Smith Center, Kansas, on March 24, 1887, weighing more than 13 pounds. But at the hospital, Delmont told police that Rappe had been raped by Arbuckle at the party and on September 11, 1921, the comedian was arrested. Today, even people familiar with the name of Fatty Arbuckle believe the worst of him. Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle had long been a performer. Author David Yallop cites Arbuckle's father's full name as William Goodrich Arbuckle as the inspiration behind the alias. The third jury took the unusual step of giving Arbuckle a written statement of apology for his treatment by the justice system. Delmont later made a statement incriminating Arbuckle to the police in an attempt to extort money from Arbuckle's attorneys. Additionally, the jury wrote an apology to Arbuckle: Being acquitted was not the end to Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle's problems. [56] In 2007, director Kevin Connor planned a film, The Life of the Party, based on Arbuckle's life. He didn't like his nickname and asked friends to call him "Roscoe." Like many comedians, he came out of a. There she met dress designer Robert Moscovitz and they became engaged, but shortly afterward he was killed in a streetcar accident, and Rappe moved to Los Angeles.