In Comedy Is a Man in Trouble, Dale gives slapstick its due, treating this lowest form of physical humor as the highly demanding, delicately calibrated art that it is. Comedy Is a Man in Trouble is an enjoyable book, plainly written and unpretentious, enlightening even if you haven’t seen all these films—and especially so when you have. There were 40,000 reels of comedy produced in the silent era alone, and Dale seems to have seen every one that has survived. His enthusiasm is infectious, and he makes you want to search out those classics you may have missed—The General, The Freshman, The Great Dictator. He even encourages you to take a second look at comedians like Lewis and Carrey, who, like all their brethren, persuade us only too well not to take them seriously.