Buster Keaton in The Navigator (1924) beside the former A.D. Moore mansion on Divisadero at Pacific.
Buster Keaton in Pacific Heights? Charlie Chaplin at Fisherman’s Wharf? Harold Lloyd at UC Berkeley? The great silent comedians did not limit themselves to filming in Hollywood, as I will discuss during my San Francisco’s Silent Echoes presentation this Thursday, September 17, 7:00 p.m. at the Presidio Officers’ Club. Presented in association with The San Francisco Silent Film Festival, the event is free, although advance registration is required. Of particular interest to history buffs, my talk will cover both lost local landmarks, such as Oakland’s Idora Park (1903-1929) featured in the Mabel Normand/Roscoe Arbuckle Keystone comedy Mabel’s Willful Way (1915), and settings that remain remarkably unchanged more than 90 years later.
Mabel Normand and Roscoe Arbuckle feed the bears at the former Idora Park in Oakland.
Douglas Fairbanks in front of the Ferry Building (standing in for New York) in When The Clouds Roll By (1919).
This link below will download a PDF tour of where Buster Keaton filmed scenes in San Francisco.
Chaplin-Keaton-Lloyd film locations (and more) 