Here's a short interview from 1964 with Buster Keaton. In the first part, he talks about a movie he tried unsuccessfully to get made at MGM — an all-star parody of that studio's blockbuster, Grand Hotel. At the time he proposed it, Keaton was considered unreliable, unbankable and unable to refrain from alcohol…so for those reasons alone, the movie was never made. (In case anyone's puzzled about the reference to "Babe Hardy," that was Oliver Hardy's offscreen nickname.)
Then Keaton talks about the decline of comedy films…and the reasons he gives are probably valid, though in his case, it probably also had a lot to do with drinking. Anyway, it's interesting to hear him talk about those days…