At Silver Screen Secrets, we love uncovering the quirky origins of things we take for granted today—like the selfie. You might think selfies started with smartphones and selfie sticks, but here’s a shocker: the first known selfie in movie history was taken with a stick way back in 1925, and it’s tied to the magic of early cinema.
The story takes us to the set of The Cameraman, a 1928 silent comedy starring Buster Keaton, but the selfie moment actually happened a few years earlier during Keaton’s career. In 1925, while experimenting with new filming techniques, Keaton and his crew rigged up a makeshift “stick” to hold a camera and capture a self-portrait on film. The idea was simple: Keaton wanted to see how he looked on screen while performing a stunt, so he attached a lightweight camera to a long pole, pointed it at himself, and rolled the film. The result? A grainy, black-and-white clip of Keaton mugging for the camera—a true cinematic selfie, decades before the term even existed.
This wasn’t just a gimmick—it showed Keaton’s genius for innovation. As a silent film star, he was always pushing boundaries, whether through daring stunts or clever camera tricks. The stick he used was a precursor to modern selfie sticks, proving that filmmakers have been finding creative ways to capture themselves on screen for nearly a century. Keaton’s playful self-portrait didn’t make it into a final film, but it’s now a cherished piece of movie history, preserved in archives as a testament to his pioneering spirit.
This little-known fact reminds us how much of today’s tech has roots in the early days of Hollywood. At Silver Screen Secrets, we’re thrilled to share these hidden stories that make film history so fascinating, and we’ve got plenty more up our sleeve.
What’s the oldest selfie you’ve seen? Drop us a line at contact@movie-trivia.com—we’d love to hear from you! If you enjoyed this trivia, share it with your fellow film fans and stay tuned for more Hollywood secrets that’ll surprise you.