Oliver Hardy

A look at the life and work of Charlie Chaplin in his own words featuring an in-depth interview he gave to Life magazine in 1966.

The lives of Stan Laurel (1890-1965) and Oliver Hardy (1892-1957), on the screen and behind the curtain. The joy and the sadness, the success and the failure. The story of one of the best comic duos of all time: a lesson on how to make people laugh.

Some of MGM's musical stars review the studio's history of musicals. From The Hollywood Revue of 1929 to Brigadoon, from the first musical talkies to Gene Kelly in Singin' in the Rain.

Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire present more golden moments from the MGM film library, this time including comedy and drama as well as classic musical numbers.

Period music, film clips and newsreel footage combined into a visual exploration of the American entertainment industry during the Great Depression.

A celebration of Hollywood in the 1930s, featuring a compilation of clips from features and newsreels of the era.

Film historian Robert Youngson presents a feature-length anthology of rarely seen silent films by comedy legends Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Along with clips from many of the shorts that made the duo stars, it includes clips from a 1918 comedy starring Laurel on his own as well as scenes from three shorts Hardy made in 1917 and '18 with his original comedy partner, Billy West. To put the duo's work in context, the film briefly features other comedians who worked with producer Hal Roach.

A horse trainer who has fallen on hard times looks to his horse, Broadway Bill, to finally win the big race.

John Breen (John Wayne), a Kentucky militiaman falls in love with French exile Fleurette De Marchand (Vera Ralston). He discovers a plot to steal the land that Fleurette's exiles plan to settle on and aims to foil it.

The Dancing Masters is a 1943 Laurel and Hardy feature film. The plot involves the team running a ballet school, and getting involved with an inventor. A young Robert Mitchum has an uncredited cameo role as a fraudulent insurance salesman.

The boys get jobs as a butler and maid-- Stan in drag-- for a dinner party. When that ends in disaster, they resort to sweeping streets and accidentally capture a bank robber. The grateful bank president sends them to Oxford, at their request, and higher-education hijinks ensue.

The two-man Laurel and Hardy Zoot Suit Band find themselves fronting a scam for "gasolene pills" in wartime oil-short America. They are however soon on the side of the angels helping recover $10,000 for an attractive young lady whose family have themselves been swindled.

Two bumblers, failures as businessmen and air raid wardens, stumble across a nest of Nazi saboteurs bent on blowing up the local magnesium plant.

Stan and Ollie get involved with con men, crooks, a genial magician, and two interchangeable coffins with disastrous but funny results.

Laurel and Hardy join the army. They are hardly soldiers, but they believe their employer, (Dick Nelson) will need them now he's drafted.

Stan and Ollie work in a horn factory. Ollie starts having violent fits every time he hears a horn. His doctor prescribes a restful sea voyage. Mayhem ensues.

Stan and Ollie try to deliver the deed to a valuable gold mine to the daughter of a dead prospector. Unfortunately, the daughter's evil guardian is determined to have the gold mine for himself and his saloon-singer wife.

Stan and Ollie are mousetrap salesmen hoping for better business in Switzerland, with Stan's theory that because there is more cheese in Switzerland, there should be more mice.

Stan and Ollie travel with a band of 18th-century Gypsies holding a nobleman's daughter.

The story begins in 1917 with Stan and Ollie being drafted into the U.S. Army to fight in World War I. While in the Army, the pair befriend a man named Eddie Smith, who is killed by the enemy during a battle. After the war is over, Stan and Ollie venture to New York City, where they begin a quest to reunite Eddie's little daughter with her rightful family. The task proves both monumental and problematic as the boys discover just how many people in New York have the last name Smith.

Ollie and Stan deceive their wives into thinking they are taking a medically necessary cruise when they are really going to a lodge convention.

First, Ollie can't find his hat. Then he and Stan attempt to install a rooftop radio antenna.

Ollie falls in love with a woman. When he discovers she's already married, he unsuccessfully attempts suicide but he and Stan then decide to join the Foreign Legion to get away from their troubles. When they’re arrested for soon trying to desert the Legion—they escape a firing squad by stealing an aircraft.

It's 1938, but Stan doesn't know the war is over; he's still patrolling the trenches in France, and shoots down a French aviator. Oliver sees his old chum's picture in the paper and goes to visit Stan who has now been returned to the States and invites him back to his home.

Two wannabe bandits join the service of a dashing nobleman, who secretly masquerades as Fra Diavolo, a notorious outlaw.

Oliver is making plans to marry his sweetheart Dulcy with Stan as his best man, but the plans are thwarted when Dulcy's father sees a picture of Ollie and forbids the marriage. The couple plan to elope, and run away to a Justice of the Peace. After typical Laurel and Hardy blundering, they manage to sneak the girl away from her father's house.

It's Prohibition, and the boys wind up behind bars after Stan sells some of their home-brew beer to a policeman.

Stan and Ollie have set up their own electrical appliance store but, unfortunately for them, the grocery right next door is run by the man and wife whom they encountered in "Them Thar Hills" (1935). Stan and Ollie go and visit to offer the hand of friendship, but the grocer again becomes convinced that Ollie and his wife are fooling around.

Ollie Dee and Stannie Dum try to borrow money from their employer, the toymaker, to pay off the mortgage on Mother Peep's shoe and keep it and Little Bo Peep from the clutches of the evil Barnaby. When that fails, they trick Barnaby, enraging him.

Stan and Ollie join the French Foreign Legion after Ollie's sweetheart rejects him.

Down and out Stan and Ollie beg for food from a friendly old lady who provides them with sandwiches. While eating, they overhear the lady's landlord tell her he's going to throw her out because she can't pay her mortgage. They don't realize that the old lady is really rehearsing for a play. Stan and Ollie decide to help the old lady by selling their car. During the auction a drunk puts a wallet in Stan's pocket. Ollie accuses Stan of robbing the old lady, but when the truth is revealed Stan takes revenge on Ollie.

A modest country doctor in the antebellum South has to contend with his daughter's upcoming marriage and an affectionate medicine show elephant.

Stan and Ollie stow away to Scotland expecting to inherit the MacLaurel estate. When things don't quite turn out that way, they unwittingly enlist in the Scottish army and are posted to India.

Stan and Ollie are greeting card salesmen who agree to help a woman put a spark in her loveless marriage by making her husband jealous.

The boys think their days of fishing to feed themselves have come to an end, when Stan's rich uncle Ebenezer dies leaving a large estate. But they soon learn that Ebenezer was murdered and all the relatives, including Stan, are suspects.

The Laurel & Hardy Moving Co. have a challenging job on their hands (and backs): hauling a player piano up a monumental flight of stairs to Prof. von Schwarzenhoffen's house. Their task is complicated by a sassy nursemaid and, unbeknownst to them, the impatient Prof. von Schwarzenhoffen himself. But the biggest problem is the force of gravity, which repeatedly pulls the piano back down to the bottom of the stairs.

Although they are successful fishmongers, Stan convinces Ollie that they should become fishermen too, but making a boat seaworthy isn't an easy task.

Stan and Ollie try to hide their pet dog Laughing Gravy from their exasperated, mean tempered landlord, who has a "No Pets" policy.

In this short film, Laurel and Hardy wage battle with inanimate objects, their co-workers, and the laws of physics during a routine work day at a sawmill.

Barbershop owners Stan and Ollie answer an ad in the newspaper from a wealthy widow looking for a husband. Ollie only mails in his response and is invited to the widow's mansion. Stan discovers his unmailed letter and insists on tagging along. At the mansion, the widow's creepy butler informs them that the woman is crazy. She was once jilted by an Oliver and now her hobby is marrying Olivers and then slitting their throats. Now the boys must figure out how to escape.

Stan and Ollie check into a seedy hotel and help a young girl escape the clutches of the landlord. They are forced to flee the hotel with no money and Ollie arranges for Stan to fight at a local boxing hall for $50. Stan's opponent turns out to be Musgy who uses a loaded glove. During the fight the glove is swapped and Stan triumphs only to find that Ollie has bet their fee that he would lose.

Two homeless vagabonds hide out in a vacant mansion and pose as the residents when prospective lessees arrive and try to rent it.

In a packed courtroom, Butch Long vows revenge on 'squealers' Laurel and Hardy whose evidence has helped to send him to prison. Frightened, the boys plan to leave town and advertise for someone to share expenses with them. The woman who answers the ad is actually Butch's girlfriend. Meanwhile Butch escapes and hides in a trunk in his girlfriend's apartment where he gets locked inside. Not realizing who it is, Stan and Ollie finally manage to get the trunk open and then Butch exacts his revenge.

Fight manager takes out an insurance policy on his puny pugilist and then proceeds to try to arrange for an accident so that he can collect.

Two sailors on shore leave rent a car and go on a drive with their dates, but soon get involved in a huge traffic jam with dozens of ill-tempered motorists. A minor collision sets off an escalating series of retaliations.

A farm girl learns she is a princess and is swept away by a tornado to the land of Oz.

Stanley and Oliver are adopted by a runaway goat, whose noise and aroma in turn get the goat of their suspicious landlord.

Stan and Ollie wreak havoc at an upper class hotel in their jobs as footman (Hardy) and doorman (Laurel). They partially undress blonde bombshell Jean Harlow (in a brief appearance) and repeatedly escort a stuffy nobleman into an empty elevator shaft.

Mishaps befall a new home owner located next door to an insane asylum.

Laurel and Hardy try to entertain a female neighbor, unbeknown to Hardy’s wife.

After a night of carousing, a rich oil tycoon awakes to find that he was married the night before. He calls in his lawyer to straighten things out.

Two debt collectors try to repossess a console radio.

Stan is a sailor whose girl gets kidnapped by a rough sea captain. Stan dresses in drag and seduces the captain but the captain's wife catches him. Stan and his girl beat a hasty retreat as the captain's wife fires off a parting shot.

Pompous J. Piedmont Mumblethunder greets his nephew from Scotland who arrives in kilts. He is immediately taken to a tailor for a pair of proper pants.

Two families embark on a pleasant Sunday picnic but manage to run into a variety of issues with their temperamental automobile. Each incident requires repeated exits and reboardings by Laurel, Hardy, their wives and grouchy, gout-ridden Uncle Edgar.

Inexperienced waiters (Laurel & Hardy) are hired for a swank dinner party.

Stan complains of a toothache and he and Ollie visit the dentist. Ollie gets his teeth pulled by mistake. Under the influence of laughing gas, they leave and cause much commotion on the road annoying a traffic cop.

Short King Bee Studios slapstick comedy featuring Billy West and Oliver Hardy

Lucy works for the Grouch family, and is used to being overworked and abused. But when Mr. Grouch punches her sweetheart, Bill, she has had enough. She grabs a knife and chases Mr. Grouch until he apologizes to Bill.

Plump and Runt are street musicians who are rivals for Florence's affection.