Acting

Joe Roberts

Born February 2, 1871 · Albany, New York, USA

Died October 28, 1923 · aged 52

"Big Joe" Roberts, as he was known in vaudeville, toured the country with his first wife, Lillian Stuart Roberts as part of a rowdy act known as Roberts, Hays, and Roberts. Their signature routine was called "The Cowboy, the Swell and the Lady." At this time, in the first decade of the twentieth century, Buster Keaton's father, Joe Keaton, had started a summer Actors' Colony for vaudevillians betw…

Known For

One Week

One Week · 1920

Newlyweds receive a build-it-yourself house as a wedding gift—and the house can, supposedly, be built in "one week". A rejected suitor secretly re-numbers packing crates, and the husband struggles to assemble the house according to this new 'arrangement' of its parts.

Three Ages

Three Ages · 1923

The rituals of courtship, romantic rivalry, and love play out three times as a man vies with a villain for the girl. In the Stone Age, the rivalry is set off by dinosaurs, a turtle used as a ouija board, and a round of golf with stones. In ancient Rome, the men display their brawn through a chariot race, using dogs instead of horses. In contemporary times, the man finds himself overcome by modernity, including a very fragile car.

Cops

MovieComedyFamily

Buster Keaton gets involved in a series of misunderstandings involving a horse and cart. Eventually he infuriates every cop in the city when he accidentally interrupts a police parade.

The Frozen North

The Frozen North · 1922

The Frozen North

MovieComedyWestern

A mix of guns and mistaken identity leads to chaos in this satirical parody of William S. Hart's melodramatic westerns, finding Buster in the frozen north - "the last stop on the subway".

The Scarecrow

The Scarecrow · 1920

Two farmhands compete for the love of the farmer's daughter.

Day Dreams

Day Dreams · 1922

In order to impress the father of a girl he is keen on, a young man goes to the city in search of work. In his letters home he writes of his various jobs which her imagination expands into much nobler ones than those that he is actually attempting.

Neighbors

Neighbors · 1920

MovieComedyRomance

The Romeo and Juliet story played out in a tenement neighborhood with Buster and Virginia's families hating each other over the fence separating their buildings.

Convict 13

Convict 13 · 1920

A young golfer is mugged by an escaped convict and finds himself in a prison where he foils a jailbreak.

Filmography

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One Week

One Week · 1920

Newlyweds receive a build-it-yourself house as a wedding gift—and the house can, supposedly, be built in "one week". A rejected suitor secretly re-numbers packing crates, and the husband struggles to assemble the house according to this new 'arrangement' of its parts.

Piano Mover (uncredited)

Three Ages

Three Ages · 1923

The rituals of courtship, romantic rivalry, and love play out three times as a man vies with a villain for the girl. In the Stone Age, the rivalry is set off by dinosaurs, a turtle used as a ouija board, and a round of golf with stones. In ancient Rome, the men display their brawn through a chariot race, using dogs instead of horses. In contemporary times, the man finds himself overcome by modernity, including a very fragile car.

The Girl's Father

Cops

MovieComedyFamily

Buster Keaton gets involved in a series of misunderstandings involving a horse and cart. Eventually he infuriates every cop in the city when he accidentally interrupts a police parade.

Police Chief (uncredited)

The Frozen North

The Frozen North · 1922

The Frozen North

MovieComedyWestern

A mix of guns and mistaken identity leads to chaos in this satirical parody of William S. Hart's melodramatic westerns, finding Buster in the frozen north - "the last stop on the subway".

The Driver

The Scarecrow

The Scarecrow · 1920

Two farmhands compete for the love of the farmer's daughter.

Farmhand (uncredited)

Day Dreams

Day Dreams · 1922

In order to impress the father of a girl he is keen on, a young man goes to the city in search of work. In his letters home he writes of his various jobs which her imagination expands into much nobler ones than those that he is actually attempting.

The Mayor

Neighbors

Neighbors · 1920

MovieComedyRomance

The Romeo and Juliet story played out in a tenement neighborhood with Buster and Virginia's families hating each other over the fence separating their buildings.

Her Father (uncredited)

Convict 13

Convict 13 · 1920

A young golfer is mugged by an escaped convict and finds himself in a prison where he foils a jailbreak.

The Crazed Prisoner

The Play House

The Play House · 1921

MovieComedyFantasy

Upon waking from the dream of a theater peopled entirely by numerous Buster Keatons, a lowly stage hand causes havoc everywhere he works.

Actor / Stage Manager (uncredited)

My Wife's Relations

My Wife's Relations · 1922

My Wife's Relations

Buster and a woman are mistakenly married and her initially unfriendly family begins to treat him nicely when they come to believe he has a large inheritance awaiting him.

Brother

Our Hospitality

Our Hospitality · 1923

Our Hospitality

MovieComedyRomance

A young man falls for a young woman on his trip home; unbeknownst to him, her family has vowed to kill every member of his family.

Joseph Canfield

The Electric House

The Electric House · 1922

The Electric House

Botany major Buster mistakenly graduates in electrical engineering and is hired to wire a new home.

Millionaire

Hard Luck

Hard Luck · 1921

A down on his luck young man makes several attempts at committing suicide but fails them too. He then finds himself becoming more confident through a series of petty adventures, to such an extent that this becomes his undoing.

Lizard Lip Luke

The Haunted House

The Haunted House · 1921

The Haunted House

MovieComedyHorror

A bank teller becomes involved with a hold-up, counterfeiters and a theatrical troupe posing as spooks in a haunted house.

Bank Cashier

The High Sign

The High Sign · 1921

MovieCrimeComedy

Buster is thrown off a train near an amusement park. There he gets a job in a shooting gallery run by the Blinking Buzzards mob. Ordered to kill a businessman, he winds up protecting the man and his daughter by outfitting their home with trick devices.

Leader of Buzzards

The Love Nest

The Love Nest · 1923

In an attempt to forget his lost sweetheart, Buster takes a long trip at sea where he boards a whaling ship with a strict captain.

Captain of the Whaler

Little Lord Fauntleroy

Little Lord Fauntleroy · 1921

Little Lord Fauntleroy

An American boy turns out to be the long-lost heir of a British fortune. He is sent to live with the cold and unsentimental lord who oversees the trust.

Buzz Saw Brannigan (uncredited)

The Goat

The Goat · 1921

A series of misadventures occur when Buster is mistaken for a criminal on the lam.

Police Chief

The Blacksmith

The Blacksmith · 1922

Buster clowns around in a blacksmith's shop until he and the smithy get in a fight which sends the smithy to jail. Buster helps several customers with horses, then destroys a Rolls Royce while fixing the car parked next to it.

Blacksmith

The Misfit

The Misfit · 1924

THE MISFIT - starring Clyde Cook, with Blanche Payson and Joe Roberts. A rarely-seen silent comedy short. Henpecked hubby Clyde totes groceries and paints floors for his wifey, escaping at last...by joining the U.S. Marines. The basic training sequence was shot at the Buster Keaton studios; this may be "Big" Joe Roberts' final screen role.

The Drill Master

The Paleface

The Paleface · 1922

MovieWesternComedy

A butterfly collector unwittingly wanders into an Indian encampment while chasing a butterfly, but the tribe has resolved to kill the first white man who enters their encampment because white oil tycoons are trying to force them from their land.

The Indian Chief

The Primitive Lover

The Primitive Lover · 1922

The Primitive Lover

MovieComedyRomance

A free-spirited girl is caught between her love for her husband and her attraction to a handsome adventurer.

'Roaring' Bill Rivers