Now here’s an idea I could get behind–as long as I don’t have to join the French Foreign Legion, get chased by an airplane, etc.
Admire, yes. Relive, no. But if any of you want to relive, I have a piano that needs to be delivered…
Well, here’s another fine mess you’ve gotten me into.
Common misconception. The line Oliver Hardy consistently utters is “Here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into.”
One of their early sound films was entitled “Another Fine Mess,” and apparently this got morphed into the saying.
The Anglican priest quoted in the piece mistakenly states Laurel and Hardy’s shorts were “not longer than 10 minutes or so.” In fact, none of their films (except a government-sponsored informational short made in the 40s) was that short.
Most were two-reelers, approximately 20 minutes in length. There were also a few three-reelers (about 30 minutes) and one four-reeler (around 45 minutes). The rest were feature films, though several of those were on the short side, just over 60 minutes.
The Sons of the Desert have been around since the early 1960s. It’s always nice to see a new tent start up. A friend and I started one in the late 70s that lasted several years and was fairly active. But then we started having kids and other responsibilities, and it was harder to keep it going.
I wish the Flying Deuces lots of good fortune. For my money, Laurel and Hardy made the greatest comedy films of all time. Chaplin and Keaton’s may have been artier, and I admire them greatly. But The Boys will always be at the top of my list, as they have been for over 50 years now.
I’ve always wanted to join The Sons of the Desert, but the nearest tent is 90 miles away. I suppose we could try to start a tent here, but my daughter and I would probably be the only members.
[OH] Why… don’t… you… do… something… to… help… me? [/OH] Oh, you did. Thanks for the clarification. 
I live just down the street from the steps where they shot that one. I walk up those stairs pretty much every day for exercise… thankfully, I don’t have to lug a piano up with me!
Their talkies are just as funny as their silents. Even Buster and Charlie couldn’t claim that.
Chaplin essentially ignored talkies until he abandoned the tramp character in The Great Dictator (1940). City Lights (1931) and Modern Times (1936) were made well after silent films had met their doom, but outside of their musical scores and/or sound effects they were silent (i.e., no character dialog is heard).
Keaton made a valiant effort to adapt to sound, but the essential nature of his silent film persona was abandoned, and the majority of his talkies are hard to watch.
“Funnier” is subjective, of course. I personally treasure Laurel and Hardy films from both the silent and sound eras. There are those who will put the silents on a higher plane, but I think sound added immeasurably to defining the characters of Stan and Ollie.
There is no question that Laurel and Hardy survived and thrived during the transition from silent to sound far better than any other comics (and most dramatic actors as well).
The critic Walter Kerr, in his book The Silent Clowns, makes the point that L&H (and the Hal Roach Studios generally) changed the pace of silent comedy, from frenetic (the camera operators on comedy films generally would deliberately undercrank to make the action faster and less earthbound than it would be in real life) to a more realistic cadence.
Thus Laurel and Hardy were already operating at this pace when sound came in and didn’t have to make any radical adjustments to their comedy style.
I see irony in the fact that the greatest comedy team in history is celebrated by the title of the most unfunny movie since the creation of celluloid.
Each tent of The Sons Of The Desert takes the name of one film. This is just one new tent (which is why it really isn’t news), and all the better film titles are already taken.
Here’s a reconstruction of the lost 1927 silent precursor to The Music Box:
You obviously have never seen the post-1940 Laurel and Hardy films produced at Fox and MGM.
The Flying Deuces was produced at an independent studio rather than by Hal Roach, and it is among their weaker pre-1941 features. But it’s a comic masterpiece compared with what came after.
The name of the parent organization celebrates Laurel and Hardy’s finest feature film, one of the few that can truly be said to be on an equal plane with their shorts.