He Did and He Didn't

Roscoe Arbuckle: He Did and He Didn't (1916). The poster from IMDb.

Roscoe Arbuckle: He Did and He Didn't (1916) with Mabel Normand (the doctor's wife), Fatty Arbuckle (the doctor) and William Jefferson (her schoolmate who is paying a visit). My screenshot from YouTube / EYE.

Roscoe Arbuckle: He Did and He Didn't (1916). Fatty Arbuckle (the doctor) and William Jefferson (his wife's schoolmate). The strange events of the night have been a shared hallucination. Oh yes... the lobsters we ate at dinner! My screenshot from YouTube / EYE.

HE DID AND HE DIDN’T (Triangle-Keystone, US 1916)
    Dir: Roscoe Arbuckle; ph: Elgin Lessley; cast: Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle, Mabel Normand, William Jefferson, Al St. John, Joe Bordeau; rel. 30.1.1916.
    35 mm, 2 rls., 1440 ft /18 fps/ 21 min, Library of Congress.
    He Did and He Didn't online via EYE Film Institute.
    Grand piano: Donald Sosin.
    Viewed at Teatro Zancanaro, Sacile, Le Giornate del Cinema Muto (GCM): Fort Lee, 12 Oct 2004

Richard Koszarski (GCM): "Adam Kessel and Charles Baumann, operators of the New York Motion Picture Company, were associated with both the Triangle Film Corporation and the Willat Studios, Inc., a laboratory and studio facility which “Doc” Willat opened at the corner of Main Street and Linwood Avenue in 1914. While the stages were often rented by William Fox, in 1916 they were renamed the Triangle East Coast Studios, and Douglas Fairbanks, “Fatty” Arbuckle, and Mabel Normand arrived from California to make pictures in Fort Lee. Arbuckle shot seven of his finest two-reelers here, including The Waiters’ Ball and A Reckless Romeo. Obviously responding to the general acclaim now being accorded Chaplin’s films, Arbuckle had removed himself from Mack Sennett’s supervision to produce a new style of comedy in the East. “I have always thought that there was room for beautiful scenic achievements in comedy as well as the kick and the custard pie,” he told one reporter on the set of this, his first Fort Lee production. Arbuckle may have been striving for beauty, but what he delivered was a precocious black comedy with enough dream imagery to stagger a surrealist. Even he never went there again." – Richard Koszarski (GCM)

AA: Roscoe Arbuckle expanding his horizon with a comedy nightmare about jealousy. He was not the first one in film history to create a black comedy, having been preceded by Europeans and also Americans, but for a Keystone comedy produced by Mack Sennett and co-starring Mabel Normand this was something new. Made just before Arbuckle's most brilliant period.