Editing Mutt and Jeff (section)

===Live-action===
{{Main|List of Mutt and Jeff live-action shorts}}
In early July 1911, during the [[silent film|silent era]] of motion pictures, at [[David Horsley]]'s [[Nestor Studios|Nestor Comedies]] in [[Bayonne, New Jersey]], [[Al Christie]] began turning out a weekly one-[[reel#Motion picture terminology|reel]] live-action ''Mutt and Jeff'' [[comedy film|comedy]] [[short film|short]], which was based on the comic strip.

The ''Mutt and Jeff'' [[serial film|serial]] was extremely popular and after the Nestor Company established a [[movie studio|studio]] in [[Hollywood, Los Angeles|Hollywood]], in late October 1911, Christie continued to oversee a weekly production of a one-reel episode.

In the fall of 1911, Nestor began using an alternate method of displaying the [[intertitle]]s in the ''Mutt and Jeff'' comedies. Instead of a [[cut (transition)|cut]] to the dialogue titles, the dialogue was displayed at the bottom of the image on a black background so the audience could read them as a [[Subtitle (captioning)|subtitle]], which was similar to the way they appeared in the cartoon strips. Horsley was very proud of the device and claimed to have entered a patent on it. He advertised the ''Mutt and Jeff'' movies as "talking pictures".<ref>Eileen Bowser. ''The Transformation of Cinema 1907–1915''. Charles Scribner's Sons. 1990. p. 144. {{ISBN|0-684-18414-1}}.</ref>

The first actors to portray Mutt and Jeff in the comedy shorts were Sam D. Drane, a tall man noted for his resemblance to [[Abraham Lincoln|President Lincoln]], whom he actually played in his last movie, ''The Crisis'' (1916), as A. Mutt, and Gus Alexander, whose nickname was "Shorty," as Jeff. When Alexander left the serial, Christie hired the actor [[Bud Duncan]]. Duncan played Jeff in two installments before the serial ended in 1912.<ref>Anthony Balducci. ''Lloyd Hamilton: Poor Boy Comedian of Silent Cinema''. McFarland. 2009. p. 19. {{ISBN|0-7864-4159-3}}.</ref>