Stan Laurel

Acting

Stan Laurel

Born 1890-06-16 · Ulverston, Lancashire, England, UK

Stan Laurel (born Arthur Stanley Jefferson; June 16, 1890 – 23 February 1965) was an English comic actor, writer, and film director who was part of the comedy duo Laurel and Hardy. He appeared with his comedy partner Oliver Hardy in 107 short films, feature films, and cameo roles. Laurel began his career in music hall, where he developed a number of his standard comic devices, including the bowler hat, the deep comic gravity, and the nonsensical understatement. His performances polished his skills at pantomime and music hall sketches. He was a member of "Fred Karno's Army", where he was Charlie Chaplin's understudy. He and Chaplin arrived in the United States on the same ship from the United Kingdom with the Karno troupe. Laurel began his film career in 1917 and made his final appearance in 1951. From 1928 onwards he appeared exclusively with Hardy, and Laurel officially retired from the screen following his comedy partner's death in 1957. In 1961 Laurel was given a Lifetime Achievement Academy Award for his pioneering work in comedy, and he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7021 Hollywood Blvd. In 2009, a bronze statue of the Laurel and Hardy duo was unveiled in Laurel's hometown of Ulverston, England.

Acting credits

Another Fine Mess poster
6.9

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

Another Fine Mess

1930

Playing at Politics poster
7.0

Ollie is running for mayor and an old flame threatens to blackmail him.

Playing at Politics

1931

Block-Heads poster
7.0

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.

Block-Heads

1938

Perfect Day poster
7.0

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.

Perfect Day

1929

Pardon Us poster
6.5

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

Pardon Us

1931

The Chiselers poster
6.8

Having been kicked out by their wives on a wintry night they attempt to smuggle their little dog into an apartment house where dogs are not allowed.

The Chiselers

1931

The Flying Deuces poster
6.4

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.

The Flying Deuces

1939

Hustling for Health poster
5.2

Stan Laurel is picked up at the train depot and brought back by the husband to the family home where the wife is having a suffragette meeting. None too pleased they cause mayhem and then the neighbours are brought into it as Stan cleans up the backyard by throwing all the rubbish into their award winning garden.

Hustling for Health

1919

Way Out West poster
7.1

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.

Way Out West

1937

Smithy poster
5.8

After being discharged from the 372nd infantry, on account of a bean shortage, smithy seeks employment. He finds a job on a construction site, where he helps to build a house, and soon causes havoc amongst the other workers. The construction company owner leaves for a week, and tells his secretary to send a letter to Mr. Smith telling him to complete the construction of the house while he (the owner) is away. The letter is accidently sent to Smithy who manages to complete the house. When the owner returns the house is complete, and Smithy is commended until the last support beam is removed...

Smithy

1924

Night Owls poster
7.4

Policeman Edgar Kennedy is told by his chief he better stop a string of burglaries that have been happening on his watch or else he will get the sack. He persuades vagrants Stan and Ollie to rob the chief's house so he can regain his reputation by catching them. The policeman promises to later get the boys off. Things do not go as planned.

Night Owls

1930

Sons of the Desert poster
7.1

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

Sons of the Desert

1933

Babes in Toyland poster
6.3

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.

Babes in Toyland

1934

Nothing But Trouble poster
6.3

Two bumbling servants are hired by a dizzy society matron to cook and serve a meal for visiting royalty.

Nothing But Trouble

1944

Beau Hunks poster
6.8

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

Beau Hunks

1931

The Devil's Brother poster
6.8

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

The Devil's Brother

1933

A Chump at Oxford poster
6.9

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.

A Chump at Oxford

1940

Wide Open Spaces poster
6.3

Wide Open Spaces is a 1924 Western silent film starring Stan Laurel.

Wide Open Spaces

1924

Our Wife poster
7.1

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.

Our Wife

1931

Our Relations poster
7.0

Two sailors get caught in a mountain of mix-ups when they meet their long-lost twins. Laurel and Hardy play themselves and their twins.

Our Relations

1936

Great Guns poster
5.9

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

Great Guns

1941

Air Raid Wardens poster
7.1

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

Air Raid Wardens

1943

Towed in a Hole poster
7.0

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

Towed in a Hole

1932

That's Entertainment! III poster
7.1

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.

That's Entertainment! III

1994

Behind the camera

Way Out West poster
7.1

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.

Way Out West

1937

Way Out West poster
7.1

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.

Way Out West

1937

Sons of the Desert poster
7.1

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

Sons of the Desert

1933

Wandering Papas poster
5.4

A cook for bridge constructors is told to collect food for dinner-Ritz style trout, Palmer house rabbit and a 15cm frosted cake. He sets off into the wide open spaces to collect the food, coming into contact with a mad hermit, who hates anybody seeing his daughter, before returning to cook dinner.

Wandering Papas

1926

Wandering Papas poster
5.4

A cook for bridge constructors is told to collect food for dinner-Ritz style trout, Palmer house rabbit and a 15cm frosted cake. He sets off into the wide open spaces to collect the food, coming into contact with a mad hermit, who hates anybody seeing his daughter, before returning to cook dinner.

Wandering Papas

1926

Our Wife poster
7.1

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.

Our Wife

1931

Our Relations poster
7.0

Two sailors get caught in a mountain of mix-ups when they meet their long-lost twins. Laurel and Hardy play themselves and their twins.

Our Relations

1936

Towed in a Hole poster
7.0

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

Towed in a Hole

1932

Unfriendly Enemies poster
6.5

Finlayson plays an intrepid army cameraman on the battlefield in the world war, and Rowe plays his hapless assistant. Cranking away in no man's land, they take foolish chances and must dodge flying shells, falling down and losing their film repeatedly.

Unfriendly Enemies

1925

Unfriendly Enemies poster
6.5

Finlayson plays an intrepid army cameraman on the battlefield in the world war, and Rowe plays his hapless assistant. Cranking away in no man's land, they take foolish chances and must dodge flying shells, falling down and losing their film repeatedly.

Unfriendly Enemies

1925

Busy Bodies poster
7.3

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.

Busy Bodies

1933

County Hospital poster
6.8

Ollie is in the hospital with a broken leg. When Stan comes to visit him, total chaos ensues.

County Hospital

1932

Pack Up Your Troubles poster
6.8

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.

Pack Up Your Troubles

1932

Them Thar Hills poster
7.5

Stan and Ollie travel to the mountains for Ollie's health, and park their caravan near a well into which a gang of moonshiners have earlier dumped their moonshine; and the boys proceed to quench their thirst thinking that it is iron-rich mountain water. The real trouble doesn't begin, though, until a married motoring couple stop by to borrow some gasoline, and the already-cranky husband leaves his thirsty wife with the boys while he goes off to refill his car's empty gas-tank. A sequel was made to this film: TIT FOR TAT, q.v.

Them Thar Hills

1934

The Bohemian Girl poster
6.2

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

The Bohemian Girl

1936

Wife Tamers poster
7.0

Mr. Barry has a huge argument with his wife, and to make her jealous, he asks his valet to set him up with a pretty girl who is stranded in their neighborhood. He takes her out to dinner, but to his disgust he discovers that she lacks even one ounce of class and her table manners are frightening. Soon enough, Barrymore is reunited with his wife.

Wife Tamers

1926

Twice Two poster
6.7

A year prior to the first scene, Stan married Ollie's sister, and Ollie married Stan's sister in a double wedding. They all live together and Stan and Ollie work in the same office.

Twice Two

1933

The Music Box poster
7.5

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.

The Music Box

1932

The Midnight Patrol poster
6.6

Novice policemen Stan and Ollie bungle a burglary investigation.

The Midnight Patrol

1933

Come Clean poster
7.2

The Hardys wish to have a quiet evening in their apartment, but are interrupted when the Laurels pay a visit. Stan and Ollie go out for ice cream, and manage to prevent a shrewish woman from committing suicide on the way back home. The woman is ungrateful and makes threats against the them unless they look after her. They spend a chaotic evening trying to keep her hidden from their wives.

Come Clean

1931

The Bullfighters poster
5.9

Bumbling detective Stan Laurel disguises himself as a famous matador in order to hide from the vengeful Richard K. Muldoon, who spent time in prison on Stan's bogus testimony.

The Bullfighters

1945

The Bullfighters poster
5.9

Bumbling detective Stan Laurel disguises himself as a famous matador in order to hide from the vengeful Richard K. Muldoon, who spent time in prison on Stan's bogus testimony.

The Bullfighters

1945

Swiss Miss poster
6.3

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.

Swiss Miss

1938

One Good Turn poster
6.9

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.

One Good Turn

1931