The Dentist (1932)
An irritable dentist takes his frustrations out on a waiting room full of patients between rounds of golf, while at home he tries to stop his daughter from eloping with the iceman by locking her in an upstairs room.
One of four shorts W.C. Fields made for Mack Sennett’s Paramount-released comedy unit, The Dentist is remembered for gags too rough for later television prints — a patient wrapped bodily around Fields’s knee during an extraction — that helped cement Fields’s persona as comedy’s most contentedly misanthropic man.
Background
The Dentist was one of four short comedies W. C. Fields made for Mack Sennett’s Paramount-released comedy unit, built around Fields’s irritable, misanthropic screen persona rather than any sustained plot. It follows a dentist who takes his frustrations out on a waiting room full of unlucky patients between rounds of golf, while at home he tries to stop his daughter from eloping with the local iceman by locking her in an upstairs room.
What to watch for
Watch for the film’s dental-office gags, including a notorious sequence in which a patient ends up physically wrapped around Fields’s knee during a difficult extraction, material rough enough that it was reportedly cut from later television prints of the short. The film helped cement Fields’s reputation as one of comedy’s most contentedly misanthropic performers, someone whose humor came from open irritation with the world rather than any attempt to be likable.
