Fred Keating

[performer]

I was fascinated to find this. You Tube has some use after all. I dearly wish there was some sound with it though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcX2tOB-Tzc

[Richard Hatch]

Wow, thanks for posting the link! Anyone know what film this is from (assuming it is from a longer feature length film)? Keating was a student of Nate Leipzig and demonstrates some of those skills at the end of this.

[Bill Mullins]

More from the same archive:

Horace Goldin

Tommy Cooper

David Devant

Max Terhune

Channing Pollock

Frakson

There is more -- go to the Huntley page and search for "magician," "houdini," etc.

[Curtis Kam]

About the Keating—love the glass thru hat. Was that ever generally available? Why don’t we see it anymore?


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[Richard Kaufman]

We don't see it because no one wears hats (except you, Curtis ).

[Leo Garet]

We don't see it because no one wears hats (except you, Curtis ).

And that bloke from You Too, or whatever they're called.

[Brad Henderson]

This popped up after I watched Keating. Jack Gwynne What an awful human being - the way he treats his animals he literally swings the rabbit by its ears and throws it across the stage. (2:40 - night club act)

[Brad Henderson]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Sh6lIp3Fpzk

Oops. Just saw the link didn’t come through.

[performer]

I have to confess I am not a fan of animals or birds being used by a magician. Magicians are always making a fuss about crediting and permission to perform or describe tricks. It has not escaped my attention that they never ask the rabbit or bird if they wish to take part in the act.

[Max Maven]

Wow, thanks for posting the link! Anyone know what film this is from (assuming it is from a longer feature length film)? Keating was a student of Nate Leipzig and demonstrates some of those skills at the end of this.

Fred Keating made about thirteen movies. I’ve managed to see most of them. Usually, he did character roles; only occasionally did he perform magic.

The recently posted clip was new to me, and my guess is that it was a short subject, not part of a full-length movie.

[Joe Lyons]

The recently posted clip was new to me, and my guess is that it was a short subject, not part of a full-length movie.

He was in a short called “Illusions” in 1929 directed by Murray Roth.
Perhaps that was it.

[Bill Mullins]

From National Board of Review Magazine Mar 1930

Fred Keating
(Vitaphone No. 907)
Interesting feats of magic.
For the family audience.
(Warner -- 1 reel)


And from Exhibitors Herald-World Oct 12 1929

Fred Keating, master magician, at present appearing in John Murray Anderson's "Almanacs" as magician and master of ceremonies, has just completed a Variety, titled "Illusions," directed by Murray Roth. Keating performs several unusual and intricate sleight-of-hand and card tricks, for which he has become famous. Keating admits that he has been interested in magic, professionally, since he was 13 years old, when he ran away from the Peekskill Military Academy and joined a troup of Chinese magicians on the stage.

[performer]

Here is some more information:
viewtopic.php?t=10710

[Bill Mullins]

It didn't get great reviews (Variety, 2/19/1930)

FRED KEATING
"Illusions"
Magician
9 Mins.
Beacon, N. Y.

Vitaphone No. 907

Nothing special as entertainment. Cut down it might make fair trailer for Keating's vaude act. Keating speaks with a potato voice, photography is flat, and the manner of presentation is off. A filler at best.

Keating's tricks are engaging bits of sleight-of-hand that click on the stage through the ingratiating and personable manner in which he executes them plus his own personality and a likeable voice. But on the screen it's different. And it's not Keating's fault. He's still personable but presents his usual act with no variations except a bunch of dumb looking extras gaping at him in a flat-looking drawing room. No story or skit to help.

The screen itself is an embodiment of illusion so powerful that presenting Keating with his coin tricks, his disappearing water glass, and card stunts shapes up as puny. They may not even believe he does 'em. And even Keating's wit can't penetrate that Illusion.

[Richard Kaufman]

About the Keating—love the glass thru hat. Was that ever generally available? Why don’t we see it anymore?

I believe it was a standard piece of apparatus around 1910 or 20--a table with a pneumatic piston built into the shaft of the table. Sure looks good!

[Chuck Romano]

P&L made a table top version of glass thru hat. So did Milson Worth.

[Curtis Kam]

Thanks for those leads, Chuck. And Bill, thank you for “potato voice”. I had no idea that was even a thing.

Interesting that the reviewer’s insights regarding the issues inherent in presenting magic through a new medium were obvious to him at that time, and still valid with each ensuing medium.


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[Richard Hatch]

This popped up after I watched Keating. Jack Gwynne What an awful human being - the way he treats his animals he literally swings the rabbit by its ears and throws it across the stage. (2:40 - night club act)

The Horace Goldin clip Bill Mullins posted above from this same source has no less than five instances of Goldin holding a rabbit by the ears to elicit the kicking response. His treatment of birds seems problematic as well. I suspect this was pretty common practice in those pre-PETA times, when canaries were sacrificed regularly in performing the bird cage vanish. Despite the cringeworthy animal handling Goldin's performance still has some great showmanship and seems to have been an influence on Gwynne, who included many of the same effects in his night club act. I really like the "chair to suitcase" effect that Goldin closes with, who has one of those?

[Richard Kaufman]

They all seem to hold the rabbits by the ears; there are others as well.

[Brad Jeffers]

Fred Keating on "The Rudy Vallee Show" aka "The Royal Gelatin Hour" - April 21, 1938

[Leo Garet]

They all seem to hold the rabbits by the ears; there are others as well.

Somewhere in "The Jinx" Anneman mentions rabbits and says that holding by the ears is the correct way to handle them.

[performer]

In that case Annemann should have stuck to mentalism. This is from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals:
https://www.rspca.org.uk/adviceandwelfa ... y/handling

Note this bit from the article particularly:
"Never pick rabbits up by their ears. It would be extremely stressful and is highly likely to injure them."

[Brad Henderson]

Holding rabbits by the ears is a terrible thing, though I understand that at that time ignorance of that fact prevailed.

But throwing them across the stage as Gwynne did?

I can’t imagine anyone, at any time, thinking for a moment this was a safe act to perform on a rabbit.

[performer]

Agreed. I am on the side of the rabbit. I don't even like the use of rabbits in a children's show even though it may well be treated correctly.
Or apparently so. I will concede that it is a good selling point in such a show. However, I bet if you asked the rabbit it would not give permission. I actually know quite a few pet psychics that I can put in touch with entertainers who are curious about the matter.

https://www.theawl.com/2017/05/how-do-p ... o-animals/