Maurice Schwartz is eating when toothache strikes, and he wanders around the apartment expressing his agony in the broadest manner. Eventually he goes to what the sign calls an "American Dentist" -- better than an English one, I suppose -- for more over-the-top miming of pain.
Schwartz was a giant of the Yiddish theater, and would found the Yiddish Arts Theater in 1918. Seeing him act in low comedy might seem odd to people who know of his reputation outside the world of slapstick, but he had a typically wandering life for an actor before he got his Jewish Actor's Union card in 1913; it was a tight-knit organization and he failed the test once, and had to do some politicking besides. He died in 1960 at the age of 69.
Schwartz was a giant of the Yiddish theater, and would found the Yiddish Arts Theater in 1918. Seeing him act in low comedy might seem odd to people who know of his reputation outside the world of slapstick, but he had a typically wandering life for an actor before he got his Jewish Actor's Union card in 1913; it was a tight-knit organization and he failed the test once, and had to do some politicking besides. He died in 1960 at the age of 69.