Nice pick, T-man. This should be on the Sift.


Gertie the Dinosaur is a 1914 short animated film by Winsor McCay that inspired many generations of animators to bring their cartoons to life. Although not the first animated film, as is sometimes thought, it was the first cartoon to feature a character with an appealing personality. The appearance of a true character distinguished it from earlier animated "trick films", such as those of Blackton and Cohl, and makes it the predecessor to later popular cartoons such as those by Walt Disney. The film was also the first to be created using keyframe animation.

The film has been selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry, and was named #6 of The 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time in a 1994 survey of animators and cartoon historians by Jerry Beck.

Gertie the Dinosaur was originally created to be used in McCay's vaudeville performances. McCay started performing "chalk talks" on vaudeville in 1906, as a sideline to his regular newspaper cartooning. In 1911, he began presenting animated films on stage, first an animation of Little Nemo in Slumberland, then How a Mosquito Operates. Plans for Gertie were announced in 1912. The episode of McCay's newspaper comic In the Land of Wonderful Dreams published in newspapers on the 21st of September 1913 showed the reader some of the creatures from the upcoming film: a diplodocus, a sea serpent and a four-winged lizard. In January of 1914, the drawings were photographed by Vitagraph Studios. The first presentation of the film was at the Palace Theater in Chicago on February 8, 1914; later performances were at the Hammerstein Theater in New York City.

The performance consisted of McCay interacting with Gertie, a cartoon Diplodocus. McCay would stand on stage in front of a projection screen, dressed in a tuxedo and wielding a whip. He would call Gertie, who appeared from behind some rocks. He then instructed her to perform various tricks, similar to a circus act. He would appear to toss a prop apple to her — McCay palmed the apple while Gertie caught an animated copy of it. Gertie was also seen to swallow a large rock, play with a Mastodon, and drink an entire lake dry. At one point, McCay would scold Gertie for misbehaving, at which she would begin to cry. For the finale, McCay disappeared behind the screen just as a cartoon version of him climbed onto Gertie's head and rode off.

More...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertie_the_Dinosaur

You're missing the point, wallace - Conway is deliberately going off script in order to try to break up his castmates.

Stage comedians have been doing that to each other since Vaudeville to keep each other sharp.

She has Vaudeville in her bones and blood, y' know she's still kickin' hard, right??

"To make this film, Cohl placed each drawing on an illuminated glass plate and then traced the next drawing-with variations-on top of it until he had some 700 drawings. In 1908, chalkboard caricaturists were common vaudeville attractions and the characters in the film look as though they've been drawn on a chalkboard, but it's an illusion. By filming black lines on paper and then printing in negative Cohl makes his animations appear to be chalk drawings."

Lloyd was my fav. comedic acrobat ala Vaudeville-
Every stunt you see him do is him do....and where do, too.

The famous clock tower and skyscraper sequences, no wires, no nets.

The good ol days.

This is a 25 year old Nat King Cole!

"excerpt#1 from the movie "Killer Diller"(1948).
In this excerpt, see the great 25 years old Nat King Cole & his Trio. Nice and smooth, always cool as he never take a look at his fingers while playing and singing. Classy !
"Killer Diller",About 70 minutes of astonishing and extremely talented jazz musicians, tappers and vaudeville comedians playing live."
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Thanks Lucky, commenting and editing working now :-)

Gervais' "genius" is starting to wear a little thin. I was expecting great things from him after his awesome The Office, but his "Whoops!! *blush* I didn't really say that did I!? Tee-hee!" Vaudeville act is getting old.

Amazing wordplay. I think this is an art that died with vaudeville, this sort of sustained riff based on miscommunication. Perfection.

Classic vaudeville act. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slowly_I_Turned