Bruce Loeb on Piano Fatty Arbuckle Shorts: Keaton gave up a lucrative Broadway contract to join Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle in his studio. From day one, recalled Arbuckle, Keaton "lived in the camera," and in these Arbuckle two-reelers, in which he plays foil to Arbuckle's dexterous fat clown, we can see him learning all he needed to know about physical comedy. In Keaton's first film appearance, in The Butcher Boy, "what we see is the perfect vaudevillian at work...his solitary calm already rivets attention" (David Robinson). The Bell Boy (1918, 22 mins), Back Stage (1919, 20 mins), The Cook (1918, 16 mins), and The Butcher Boy (1917, 22 mins): Directed by Roscoe Arbuckle. Photographed by Elgin Lessley. With Arbuckle, Buster Keaton, Al St. John, Alice Lake. (Silent, B&W, 35mm)