Nobody did a slow burn better than Oliver Hardy!
Nobody did a slow burn better than Oliver Hardy!
Your story makes sense, though. Stan Laurel was definitely the brains and boss of the team, and that seems to have suited Ollie just fine.
Flying Deuces is still my favorite. Going to youtube “Shine on Harvest Moon” right now.
And any puddle he stepped in, no matter how small, would always be five feet deep
Either BBC2 or Channel 4 also used to show old Harold Lloyd shorts in the daytime - although the only thing I remember about them is the theme tune. “Hooray for Harold Lloyd! dah-dah, dah-dah, dah-dah etc pair of glasses and a smile etc”. I remember as a kid being mind-boggled to find out that Stan Laurel was still alive in the 1960s, because I had always associated the black and white era with a very, very long time ago, before jet planes and space travel and so forth.
Looking up Laurel’s date of death I notice that Google has a giant zip through it! Yikes. I’d never really thought about Hardy’s Hitler moustache until just now. Damn you, Hitler, for destroying comedy.
I remember seeing a documentary on L&H and they were interviewing Laurels daughter. She was just a toddler but was afraid of the big man who would beat on her father. So they made a film where Laurel gave Hardy a working over and then the daughter understood it was make believe and was no longer afraid of Hardy. I tried to find the clip but so far haven’t had any luck.
I used to live in Milledgeville, Georgia, where Oliver Hardy grew up, which, along with Harlem, Georgia (believed to be his birthplace and home for his first couple of years, though there is some dispute), has a large Sons of the Desert fan base already and has held conventions where some came from all over the country. (My dog is named Ollie because he was born on the same street where Oliver Hardy worked as a projectionist, though to the extent that a dog can look like Stan he does.)
Stories about Hardy from Milledgeville:
-He was terribly obese as a child, even more than he was at the height of his fame, and his nickname was- imaginatively- Fatty. When he was an adolescent cadet at Georgia Military College in Milledgeville he got too hot in his wool uniform on a hot Georgia day and passed out, and it took six other cadets to carry him into the shade. The way we know this is it made the local paper (can you imagine the embarrassment there?) I’m guessing the success of Fatty Arbuckle helped spare him from Fatty being his professional name as well.
He was well known in Milledgeville for several reasons. The first was his immense size, of course. Another reason was for his mother, “Miss Emily”, who ran the restaurant at the local hotel and was considered one of the finest cooks/caterers in the state. The third was for his older maternal half-brothers, Bardy and Hank, who were everything “Fatty” was not: athletic, handsome, smooth with girls, charming. (Even as a child Oliver was funny but it was totally a coping mechanism; like a lot of comics, he was painfully shy.)
Oliver was particularly close to Hank, who wanted to go into show biz; I’ve never seen a picture but by all accounts he had the looks and he loved being in local plays. The two of them rented a section of a local store a few nights a week and put on shows, with Henry and others doing skits, Oliver singing (about which, more in a moment), and then some short silent comedies. (In the 1910 Census Oliver’s profession is listed as ‘Electrician/electric theater’.) Hank and Ollie planned to move down to Florida where the silent film industry was beginning to boom.
Unfortunately, Hank drowned at a big swimming party. Oliver was about 18 or 19, Hank about 22/23) it absolutely devastated Oliver. Once he recovered he went south, partly to get away from all the places he associated with his brother, and partly because it was more important than ever he succeed.
Regarding his singing voice: nobody thought of Ollie as funny enough and certainly not good looking enough to make it in show business, but he was famous for his singing voice. He sang at weddings and at all manner of affairs in the hotel his mother managed the restaurant at (she ultimately managed the hotel itself); he had a fine tenor and good baritone.
When he finally did get a major role in a motion picture it played in Milledgeville, where the local newspaper announced (not in a headline but a side column)
FATTY HARDY MAKES MOVIE!
He had another half brother, Bardy Tant, who went by Bardy Hardy after Ollie got famous. IIRC he later worked in motion pictures himself, but as a crew member.
Be Big and Flying Deuces respectively
But what made that even funnier were his vain attempts at looking dignified while he sank.
That’s probably why John Cleese has often cited Ollie as a role model- many of Cleese’s best characters are men trying to maintain a sense of dignity and decorum under absurd circumstances… and failing miserably.
I was thinking about Beau Hunks (sometimes Beau Chumps) rather than Flying Deuces 
If I ever find myself staying in a hospital I hope someone brings me some hard boiled eggs and nuts.
My favorite moment I can remember from a Laurel and Hardy sketch was one where he was singing. Stan and Oliver had to take care of a baby for some reason, and Oliver was singing a lullaby to make the baby go to sleep. When the baby was still awake after a short period of time, Ollie started singing “Go to sleep, my baby!” very loudly and angrily, and every time I watched that part I laughed so hard I could hardly breathe.
That was “Brats”, my daughter’s favorite. They played both the fathers and the children. Ollie sang the kids to sleep, then Stan decided to sing a chorus, which woke them back up. This necessitated the angry repeat performance to get them back to sleep.
There’s at least one copy of it on Youtube.
I don’t have much to add other than saying, yes, I’ve always been a bit of a fan, and… thank you for that post, Sampiro, it was an interesting read!
Thanks for providing the name, I’m watching it now!
Yeah, me too. I think Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy were *brilliant *comics and I love their “takes,” but I just cannot get into their shorts.
No, wait, that didn’t sound right . . .
You know I can’t eat hard boiled eggs and nuts.
No I did not look at the link 
The best one - Towed in a Hole (1933) - Love that one - and I just joined the Sons of the Desert. Been meaning to for years but just got round to it.
I like them but I just prefer the rapid fire anarchism of Groucho, Harpo, Chico and (sometimes) Zeppo.
Did see one of their films recently (they are in same army outfit in WWI, Stan gets left behind and patrols the trench for 20 years before he his found, Ollie brings him into his house, etc…forget the name). Still works pretty well.
I remember Jackie Gleason saying he used to go drinking with “Babe Hardy” as he called him (I assume some people made a connection with Babe Ruth) and that Hardy drank like his character…exaggerated motions with his pinky raised. Gleason also said that Laurel was the brains of the group. That fits in with what other people have said. I noticed recently in reading about Gracie Allen on wiki that while her comedic character was often silly and stupid (although often she could do things quickly, like a jigsaw puzzle that stumped everyone else), in reality she was a very bright person.
To this day all I have to think of is an irate woman saying, “Officer, he kicked me in the middle of my daily duties!” to get me chuckling. I think it was the first double entendre I ever made out by myself.