What I’m watching: a sweet and nostalgic biopic

Date: 2/6/2019

What I’m watching: a sweet and nostalgic biopic.

In theaters: Stan and Ollie

Besides some bending of the truth, my only criticism of this new film about the end of the career of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy is the fact if you don’t know who they were and the work they did in movies, the film is problematic.

I viewed the film at the Bow Tie Cinema in Hartford and the audience was all about the same age as I am.

I wish they filmmakers had included one of their shorts as an introduction to the film.

Because classic movies from the 1930s – which was part of the standard local TV programming in my youth – is now confined to Turner Classic Movies as well as some streaming channels, it’s difficult to expose contemporary audiences to Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers, Abbott and Costello and Martin and Lewis.

Laurel and Hardy were giants in American movie comedy. The pair created unique comedic personas: Laurel was the silly man-child with moments of wisdom, while Hardy was the dumb guy who thought he was smart.

They were very popular in the latter silent days of the 1920s and made an easy conversion to sound. Through 1940, they were top box officer performers. By the early 1940s they had parted ways with their long-time producer Hal Roach and were under contract at 20th Century Fox and MGM, where they weren’t allowed control of their movies. Their careers declined.

The new film picks up “the boys,” as they were affectionately called, in the late 1940s and early 50s when they toured the music halls of the Untied Kingdom and then theaters in Western Europe. They were a great success.

Although writer Jeff Pope combines several tours at once, he does succeed in capturing Laurel and Hardy’s characters, humor and melancholy about facing the end of their careers.

It is true the two men truly became friends towards the end of their lives and they did come to the UK for one tour in the hopes of landing another film. It is also true that both men were not rich and did not get a dime from the TV sales of their films. They both suffered from health issues and Hardy left the last tour knowing he could never work again.

It is also factual that Hardy viewed himself as a comic actor, while Laurel was really the filmmaker, who worked on scripts and gags and hung out in the editing room.

What has been stretched a bit is the supposed acrimony between the two men over career decisions. Laurel and Hardy historians will debate if the boys had issues as serious as ones depicted in this film. It is true that Roach kept them signed to separate contracts so they could not have the ability to negotiate as a team. And it is also true that Roach cast Hardy in a film without Laurel, but with fellow silent screen comic Harry Langdon in a Laurel-like part.

Where this film really succeeds is the performances of Steve Coogan as Laurel and John C. Reilly as Hardy. They both had the looks and the voices, but most importantly they both project the personalities the boys had.

If you’re a fan, you should seek out this film. If you’re not and you’re interested in classic film, this film could be your introduction to a pair of wonderful comedians.

***

Growing up in Western Massachusetts, one couldn’t help but see Laurel and Hardy films on local TV, and there was an advocate for them as well in the form of film fan Hal Stanton.

The late Agawam resident worked at a local film production company and was a film collector back in the day when what was collected were 16mm film prints.

I watched Stanton as a movie-crazy teen and then became friends with him years later.

Stanton was the founder of the local chapter – called “tent” – of the Laurel and Hardy fan club called “The Sons of the Desert.” Yes, I was a member and was able to meet two of the people who worked at the Roach lot including Rosina Lawrence, who had co-starred with the boys in “Way Out West,” in 1937.

Although Stanton has passed, his “Night Owls Tent” still exists with its next meeting on April 10 in Enfield CT. For more information go to https://sites.google.com/site/nightowlstent.