Sennett, Mack

Sennett, Mack (1880-1960), American film producer and director, who introduced slapstick comedy to American cinema. He was born Michael Sinnott in Danville, Quebec, Canada. Originally a minor performer in burlesque and musicals, Sennett started his film career working with the noted director D. W. Griffith. His work was derived from the French Pathé film-style, put into Griffithian film technique.

Sennett set up his Keystone operation in 1912, introducing the new element of undercranking the camera to speed up the action, a style which became the model for all American slapstick films into the 1920s. Between 1910 and 1929 Sennett produced more than 1000 silent films, in which he created the beautiful Mack Sennett Girls and the group of comic policemen known as the Keystone Kops. Sennett directed most of the famous silent-film comedians, including Fatty Arbuckle, W. C. Fields, and Buster Keaton.