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Fred C. Newmeyer

Fred C. Newmeyer

Directing

Biography

A native of Central City, Colorado, Newmeyer is best known for directing a handful of films in the Our Gang series and for directing several Harold Lloyd movies. With Sam Taylor, Newmeyer co-directed Lloyd in films including Safety Last! (1923), Girl Shy (1924), and The Freshman (1925). Newmeyer also had an extensive directing and acting resume in other comedy short films. He appeared as an actor in 71 films between 1914 and 1923. Prior to his film career, Newmeyer played professional baseball. Partial statistics exist for his time as a left-handed pitcher in Minor League Baseball at the Class D level from 1911 to 1913 in the Southwest Texas League, Michigan State League, and Central Association.[6] He made at least 66 appearances and was the winning pitcher of at least 26 games. Newmeyer was the original director of the first short in the Our Gang series, also titled Our Gang; his version tested poorly, and producer Hal Roach scrapped most of the footage and remade the short with Robert McGowan as the director. Newmeyer, after directing numerous other shorts at Roach, returned to the Our Gang series in 1936 to direct The Pinch Singer, Arbor Day, Mail and Female and the feature film General Spanky. Newmeyer and his wife, Berna, had a son, Fred W. After his film career, Newmeyer worked with the athletic department of University High School in Los Angeles. Newmeyer died on April 24, 1967, in Woodland Hills, California, at the age of 78.

Known For

Girl Shy
7.0

Harold Meadows is a shy, stuttering bachelor working in a tailor shop, who is writing a guidebook, The Secret of Making Love, for other bashful young men. Fate has him meet rich girl Mary, and they fall in love. But she is about to wed an already married man, so our hero embarks upon a hair-raising daredevil ride to prevent the wedding.

Girl Shy

1924
The Quarterback
6.5

Elmer Stone, quarterback of the 1899 Colton College football team vows to remain a student until Colton beats its biggest rival, State University. Twenty-seven years later, Elmer is still in school and is a classmate of his son, Jack. Other than driving a milk wagon in his spare time, Jack is also the quarterback of the football team. A matter of his eligibility comes up but he is cleared and goes out to do-or-die for Colton against State University. Maybe they will win The Big Game, and Jack's father can get a life...and a job.

The Quarterback

1926
Queen High
6.5

The two partners of a ladies' garter business are constantly feuding with each other. When they ask their lawyer to dissolve their partnership, he proposes that instead the two of them play a single poker hand: the loser to become the winner's personal manservant for a year.

Queen High

1930
Subway Express
10.0

Inspector Killany of the New York City police department is called in to investigate the murder of a subway passenger and the usual-and-unusual suspects climb on and off at each stop.

Subway Express

1931
Safety Last!
7.7

When a store clerk organizes a contest to climb the outside of a tall building, circumstances force him to make the perilous climb himself.

Safety Last!

1923
Among Those Present
6.0

An ambitious coat-room checker impersonates an English nobleman.

Among Those Present

1921
Why Worry?
6.5

A hypochondriac vacations in the tropics for the fresh air - and finds himself in the middle of a revolution instead.

Why Worry?

1923
Clubs Are Trump
5.2

In pre-historic times (dream sequence), our hero, in a loin cloth, battles other cavemen over the opposite sex.

Clubs Are Trump

1917
Luke Joins the Navy
5.0

The beginning of the film you find Harold Lloyd playing his "Lonesome Luke" character. Out of the blue, Lloyd decides he's going to join the navy and you really wonder if part of the film leading to it is missing. After all, the decision seemed to come from no where and why Snub Pollard would also join is unclear. And, oddly, they seem to skip all training and are stationed on a navy ship. Soon Pollard's wife comes to the boat looking for him and she's put off the boat as the movie ends very, very anticlimactically.

Luke Joins the Navy

1916
Never Weaken
6.9

A young man schemes to drum up business for his girlfriend's employer but after seeing her being intimate with another man, he attempts to commit suicide.

Never Weaken

1921
Hot Water
6.8

Lloyd's look at married life and the issues of the in-law. Adventures include a ride on a crowded trolley with a live turkey; A wild spin in a new auto with the in-laws in tow. Finally, a sequence in which Hubby accidentally chloroforms his mother-in-law and becomes convinced that he's killed her!

Hot Water

1924
Bashful
6.9

In order to claim his inheritance, our hero must first produce a wife and family.

Bashful

1917
The Freshman
7.0

An unathletic college freshman ridiculed by his peers for his mannerisms strives to become popular by making the football team.

The Freshman

1925
Over the Fence
5.9

Snitch steals Ginger's (stolen) baseball tickets and takes Ginger's girl to the game. Finding himself without tickets, Ginger dresses as a baseball player and wins the game. A possible debut of the "Glasses" or "Boy" character.

Over the Fence

1917
Bumping Into Broadway
6.9

A young playwright spends his last cent to pay the past-due rent for the pretty dancer who's his boarding house next-door neighbor. Soon after, he winds up at a gambling club, where he wins big - just before a police raid.

Bumping Into Broadway

1919
Grandma's Boy
6.5

A meek young man must find the courage within when a rogue tramp menaces his hometown.

Grandma's Boy

1922
Now or Never
6.2

A young man, unaccustomed to children, must accompany a young girl on a train trip.

Now or Never

1921
They Never Come Back
6.3

Prizefighter Jimmy Nolan, facing an opportunity to get a championship fight, is knocked out when he sustains what is apparently a permanent injury to his arm. From there, Nolan's path leads downhill. He is drawn into a romance with a nightclub entertainer, then is framed on a theft charge by a jealous suitor. After his prison term, Nolan makes a spectacular comeback in a fight which proves his courage and integrity, while disproving the fallacy about the old sports adage that "they never come back."

They Never Come Back

1932
Secrets of Chinatown
5.3

Private detective Donegal Dawn is summoned by the police commissioner to solve the reasons for a crime wave in Chinatown.

Secrets of Chinatown

1935
Dr. Jack
6.8

Country doctor Jack Jackson is called in to treat the Sick-Little-Well-Girl, who has been making Dr. Saulsbourg and his sanitarium very rich after years of unsuccessful treatment.

Dr. Jack

1922