Happy 125th Birthday Oliver Hardy

Anyone who reads my blogs, knows that I love Laurel and Hardy, and why not? They are hilarious. And on Oliver Hardy's 125th Birthday of course I have to write about some films he appears in.

The first film we are going to look at is called The Paperhanger's Helper (also known as Stick Around) and was before Oliver Hardy teamed up with Stan Laurel. In this film he is teamed up with a forgotten actor named Bobby Ray. The relationship and humor in this film however are very reminiscent of the work he would do with Stan Laurel. There  are some distinct differences though. Oliver Hardy plays a mean character here than he would later and Bobby Ray, while talented doesn't have the charisma of Stan. Despite this however the film is very funny, and a delight to watch. So from 1925 and directed by Ted Burnsten, here is The Paperhanger's Helper.

Next up we are going to look at the first film where Stan and Ollie were teamed, Duck Soup (the supervising director was Leo McCarey who would direct the better know Marx Brother's film of the same name). Unlike most comedy teams of the time Laurel and Hardy teamed up on film, instead of some where else, first. Though they had appeared together first in 1921 with The Lucky Do, they were not a team until this film. Interestingly the film was originally going to star Stan Laurel and Syd Crossley. However for unknown reasons Syd did not appear in the film and was replaced by Oliver Hardy. The story of this short was based off a skit written by a British Music Hall comedian named Arthur Jefferson, who just happened to be Stan's father. This story would be used again for the teams talkie short Another Fine Mess. This is a delightful film and it is easy to see why the team would soon become so popular with audiences. It is also worth noting a first the studio didn't realize what it had as Stan and Ollie would make quite a few shorts separately and also both appear in films where they shared very little footage. So from 1927 and directed by Fred Guiol (with supervising direction by Leo McCarey) here is Duck Soup.

















Last but not least is one of my favorite Laurel and Hardy shorts, Their First Mistake. This short may be one of the funniest live action short subjects ever made. Along with Stan and Ollie also appearing in this film was Mae Busch (in a returning role as Mrs. Hardy (she had already played Ollie's wife in Unaccustomed As I Am, and would later return to the role for Sons of the Desert and The Bohemian Girl)) and Billy Gilbert (known to my fellow Disney lovers as the voice of Sneezy in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves), both giving great performances. Stan Laurel was known for improvising and here he improvised so much that the film went over schedule and budget that the ending was never filmed, leaving the short without a proper ending. However this is not a big deal as the film is so funny, I don't care about the lack of an ending. So from 1932 and directed by George Marshall, here is Their First Mistake.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-yDwTL3YiI

-Michael J. Ruhland