I used to have records of a bunch of their old radio shows. Honestly, I prefer them to the movies because the comedy all rides on the writing and delivery rather than just Costello mugging.
My dad saw Hellzapoppin on stage and said he laughed his ass off. This is the same guy who couldn’t stand the Marx Brothers, the Three Stooges or Spike Jones. I never understood that.
I’m very glad to read this. My grandmother was in the stage show.
Wow. Do you have any anecdotes?
A lot of stories, not all happy. But the best are from when she was a leggy assistant for Blackstone Sr. At the time of Hellzapoppin she would have been married to Billy Lowe, who sometimes sang in Frankie Masters band. No IMDB bio since she never had any lines, and she changed names frequently.
My daughter (now 29) attended a high school that specialized in the performing and visual arts. I went with her on Orientation Day and sat in on the welcoming auditorium. The presentation ended with two theatre students doing “Who’s on First?”
Every kid in the hall loved it. By the end of the sketch, they were all laughing hard and loud.
Me personally the funniest bit I’ve ever seen from then is their Susquehanna Hat Company bit, as it just keeps getting more and more absurd as it goes along.
A&C were terribly uneven, but their best bits still hold up well. “Who’s on First” is still one of the funniest bits of pure comedy ever performed (check out the reaction videos on YouTube; it never fails to delight the people who see it for the first time). There’s also “7 times 13 is 28” and “how long before she catches up.”
Their movies don’t fully hold up. The comedy outside of their routines is only fair. But I will say The Time of Their Lives is still worth seeing; Costello made a highly effective romantic character. It also stayed away from the shtick - A&C had a falling out and didn’t want to work together, so there were no comic dialogues. The two weren’t even able to talk to each other in a scene (for most of the film, Costello was a ghost who Abbott couldn’t see or hear).
You have that backwards, it was actually Voldstad who played Darryl, with Pappenfus as Darryl.
No, he had the order right. Pappenfus played Larry’s brother Darryl. Voldstad played his other brother Darryl.
Stone me, you’re right - turns out for all these years I had it the wrong way round!
My mother saw it on Broadway. She said that they rained stuff down on the audience, which you don’t quite get on TV.
I brought it up in the movies unavailable on DVD thread. It is not officially released, but I did buy a good quality DVD online.
I saw it on TV as a kid, and was worried that it wouldn’t stand up to my memories. It turned out to be funnier.
I think the destroying the production scene is better than in Night at the Opera - but not the rest of it.
So did the first guy actually cut his finger?
Laurel and Hardy.
Penn and Teller
Morcambe and Wise
Road to Morocco/ Road to Rio
Secret Life of Walter Mitty/ Wonder Man
The Great Dictator
The Miracle of Morgan’s Creek
Arsenic and Old Lace
Kind Hearts and Coronets
Passport to Pimlico
Here comes Mr Jordan.
…
Maybe I’ll start my own “why is this funny?” thread; I had seen Kind Hearts and Coronets on lists of the greatest comedies of all time and when I finally got around to watching it, I found it only mildly amusing.
Stiller and Meara
McCall and Brill
Burns and Allen
They didn’t like each other - they were married!
Haha!! Nicely played.
McCall and Brill, too; 64 years and counting.