As Charley Chase's better-known short "The Heckler" abandons basing its comedy entirely on the farcical, absurdist, social situations that Chase was a master of devising and was also a comic character study of the obnoxious fan, this short, "Calling All Doctors" does the same thing for the hypochondriac of the type of which we all know at least one. What this doesn't work as well as "The Heckler," it's still a very funny short comedy.
The first few minutes are pure gags around the hypochondria, and simple as some of them are they all bring laughs, master of quirky gag construction as Chase was. It's often forgotten how much of a talent he had for the pure goofy twist or development that it seems nobody else would think of but which draws a lot of laughs. Here an office plot to scare Charley out worrying so much about his health is accidentally tangled with what occurs when Charley happens to meet the highly amusingly surreal character of Dr. Kronkite, a madman who happens to think he's a doctor.
Of course, comic confusions ensure, though Charley doesn't get to participate quite as much as usual in all of them, contributing from his sickbed for story purposes. Dr. Kronkite especially gets to contribute to a lot of the kind of funny and clever verbal one liners that started becoming prevalent in Chase's shorts during his Columbia era (such as in "The Wrong Miss Wright" and "The Mind Needer") at a studio where many headliners focused only on visual slapstick humor.
While this doesn't reach quite the flawless heights of Charley Chase's best films, there's no reason at all not to like it for the very funny short subject that it is.
The first few minutes are pure gags around the hypochondria, and simple as some of them are they all bring laughs, master of quirky gag construction as Chase was. It's often forgotten how much of a talent he had for the pure goofy twist or development that it seems nobody else would think of but which draws a lot of laughs. Here an office plot to scare Charley out worrying so much about his health is accidentally tangled with what occurs when Charley happens to meet the highly amusingly surreal character of Dr. Kronkite, a madman who happens to think he's a doctor.
Of course, comic confusions ensure, though Charley doesn't get to participate quite as much as usual in all of them, contributing from his sickbed for story purposes. Dr. Kronkite especially gets to contribute to a lot of the kind of funny and clever verbal one liners that started becoming prevalent in Chase's shorts during his Columbia era (such as in "The Wrong Miss Wright" and "The Mind Needer") at a studio where many headliners focused only on visual slapstick humor.
While this doesn't reach quite the flawless heights of Charley Chase's best films, there's no reason at all not to like it for the very funny short subject that it is.