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(triumphant music)

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- [Narrator] Turn back with us now, turn back to a time

when the movies were much younger

and like all youthful things full of fun and high spirits.

Down that long dusty road the clowns are coming,

the great voiceless, irreplaceable clowns who

rock the world with laughter.

Most of them are gone but they

have left their shadows behind.

So come back with us now, come back to that time

of wonderful nonsense called the Roaring '20s.

Come back to the Golden Age of Comedy.

(nostalgic music)

Behind that curtain the world is 30 years younger

and an unsmiling king presides over his loony domain.

A rugged gray maned king, who has already ridden

the escalator of success from boiler maker

to chief of the first laugh factory.

The father of American screen comedy Max Sennett.

In 1924 when these only slightly exaggerated scenes

were taken the Sennett Studios were already in their

second decade of inspired madness.

Their specialty was the delightfully improbable,

like this lion in the office.

Their gags were completely visual,

a form of wit that has all but disappeared from the land.

But one which experts now agree is perhaps

the most imaginative and enduring comedy of all.

The lion has fled the scene and the king himself

has long since retired, but movie fans still fondly

remember such daring innovations as the Max Sennett

Bathing Beauties in whose rants many a star was born,

and who did so much to liberate the American woman

from the Mother Hubbard bathing suits.

Sennett Studies were place of wonderful illusion,

where a daring rider could gallop out of the west

without moving as much as an inch on the old back lot.

Indeed without evening bothering about a horse.

And far from trying to hide their bag of tricks

the Sennett technicians made them part of the comedy.

Pride of the lot was the only revolving stage in Hollywood,

a monstrous merry-go-round and treadmill,

which kept the scenery moving behind the comedian.

Hurricane gusts from the wind machine sent bits

of paper flying past the camera to help create

the appearance of swift and violent motion.

The director is Vernon Dent, the dapper man about

the stages with the roving eye is Charlie Murray.

But in Sennett comedies the pursuit of beauty was often

interrupted by the appearance of the pursuers wife,

usually played by Louise Carver.

The result with a busy studio itself as a backdrop

is the kind of slapstick which proves that motion pictures

are meant to move and that action speaks louder than words.

(comical music)

Now Sennett kids one of his own money saving customs,

stealing shots of actual happenings

to cut into his comedies.

Get a load of that peekaboo lens.

(cheerful music)

It was perfectly natural for the camera

to doze off with the cameraman.

And who could deny such things might really

happen when they happened right before your eyes.

On the firing line the neighborhood youngster,

on the receiving end, Charlie Murray.

Sennett gags were created by the maddest squad

of gag men in entertainment history.

Each day they were locked collectively into a

penthouse office, deprived of heavy food

and strong drink and guarded, cajoled

and brow beaten by the old master himself.

Here selected from the output of a decade

are some of the results.

In "The Hollywood Kid" Charlie Murray, having failed

to obtain a confession from the small fry is forced

to spank them all, well almost all.

In "Wandering Willies" Billy Bevan innocently

prepares to enjoy a delicious bowl of oyster stew

and ends up in a desperate battle with a wild oyster.

(jovial music)

In "Muscle-Bound Music" in a memorable boarding house

concert Billy Bevan and Davy Morris

combine rock'n'roll with rippin' tares.

(fast orchestra music)

In "Wall Street Blues" dashing Billy Bevan seems

to heed the call of the open road but alas

fates fickle finger has flicked him into a different role,

the office janitor.

Billy's boss is Andy Clyde, who took a boomer

in bloomers just when the girl started wearing slacks.

Meanwhile Billy is cleaning up with his new super powered

torpedo vacuum cleaner, originally designed to

pick fat ladies off massage tables.

(comical music)

With each tick of the ticker Andy gets sicker,

now in comes a slicker.

Soft hearted Jack Richardson and his toddy Vernon Dent

watch Andy play with a poison bottle,

and make side bets as to how long

it will take him to take it.

Well that kills that bet.

In pops another well wisher, Edgar Kennedy,

one of the seven original Keystone Cops.

Later to win fame and fortune

as a master of the slow burn.

It's a stick up.

Billy is marched in and soft hearted Jack makes

tracks for outer space, a perfect escape,

except for one small miscalculation.

Jack forgot they were on the 20th floor.

Vernon is reminded of his mother's advice,

if you have a bad companion, drop him.

(harrowing music)

In "Circus Today" the background is the tent show circus,

which like comedy itself has almost vanished

from the American scene.

Billy Bevan plays a dimwitted daredevil in the

pudgy clutches of Kewpie Morgan.

The stunt for this afternoon is a low dive

into a trial size swimming pool.

It's a cinch thinks Billy but he doesn't reckon

with the calamitous cupidity of the callous Kewpie.

Basking in the spotlight the blindfolded Billy

is ready to go, but Kewpie has to make one minor adjustment.

(comical music)

Now Kewpie's mad because Billy busted

his brand new swimming pool.

So Kewpie runs after Billy, Billy's pal the elephant

runs after Kewpie and in a few split seconds

we're off with chariots, circus wagons, charging horses,

toppling acrobats, panting pachyderms and roaring lions

on one of those crazy careening pursuits which became

a trademark of the Golden Age of Comedy, the chase.

(fast paced music)

(horses neigh)

(fast paced music)

(tigers growl)

(mischievous music)

In the Max Sennett comedies extra's had

to know how to take it.

(lion growls)

(screams and shouts)

Madam Stella, the circus queen is dressing

for the matinee when her maid suddenly gives notice.

"Marie!", calls Madam Stella.

"Come powder my back."

"My Marie, you're rough."

This plucky young actress giving a perfectly

controlled performance with a lion as her costar

is Madeline Hurlock, who was later to marry the

Pulitzer Prize playwright Robert Emmet Sherwood.

(lion growls)

So long Mrs Sherwood.

Max Sennett's arch rival was Hal Roach,

who late in the '20s unveiled an immortal team,

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.

Ironically as individual comedians Laurel and Hardy

had been around since the movie's early days.

Laurel had once starred but had been reduced to featured

player, Hardy had never risen above supporting roles.

Then in 1927 they were accidentally paired and almost

overnight became the movie's most popular comedy team.

Stan and Oliver were never to find much favor

with the critics but the public loved them.

When they performed an act as simple as climbing a pole

to read a street sign in the dark

gales of laughter swept round the world.

(jovial music)

Not before or since has anyone

scaled a wall like Oliver Hardy.

(bricks crash)

"The Second Hundred Years" in which they played

jailbirds with a long time to roost was one of the

earliest of the Laurel and Hardy comedies.

Hardy had not as yet quite acquired the full

roundness of physic that was to characterize him later.

(mischievous music)

A couple of visiting painters knock off for lunch

and an idea creeps into Laurel and Hardy's minds.

They'll turn their coats, swipe the brushes

and pretend their painters too,

before the guards discover they're gone, gone, gone.

(mischievous music)

Just as freedom seems completely within their grasp

Stan and Oliver become aware of a pair of suspicious eyes.

The chips are down, their futures hang in the balance.

They must prove that they're really painters

and prove it they do.

(mischievous music)

(screams)

In "We Slip Up" Laurel and Hardy starred as

hen pecked husbands making an elaborate

withdrawal from their suspicious wives.

The boys have just explained that they're merely

going to the picture show and of course the wives

believe their every word.

Downtown two young ladies are getting a shoe shine when

fate and an electric fan blow them into a great adventure.

No bonnet remains under a car for long,

not with gallant Oliver there to retrieve it.

Naturally it was no more than hospitable for

the girls to invite the boys up to dry up

and in these cozy surroundings the spirit of

fun playfully raises its tousled head.

(buzzing)

(gurgling)

Go on there Hardy, be bohemian.

(comical music)

Olive is soothing his ruffled hostess when,

you guessed it, in pops her boyfriend,

an unforgiving character named Nasty Nate.

(foreboding music)

In this emotion charged moment who should come prancing

down the street but those human bloodhounds, the wives.

(mischievous music)

"The Battle of the Century" demonstrated a rule of

natural science, if someone slips.

The pie in the face had been originated by Max Sennett

in the earliest days of his keystone comedies.

By 1928, when this film was made,

produced a pie throwing.

("Pop Goes The Weasel")

Musicians decked out like the spirit of '76

pipe and drum a congressional candidate into the kind of

dusty, sleepy, Midwestern town that has totally

disappeared since these scenes were some 35 years ago.

Here satirizing a backwoods campaigner is a man of

a type that has alas all but disappeared as well,

the cowboy who grew into an actor, humorist and philosopher

and who became at last an American legend, Will Rogers.

In this period Will was still fresh from his triumphs

in the "Ziegfeld Follies", he kidded congressmen,

presidents and kings and never offended a soul.

His wit contained no insult or malice,

yet it dissolved pretension with the cold light of logic

and in its simplicity spoke the language of all.

(crowd cheers and applauds)

In a Hal Roach comedy of 1923 called "Uncensored Movies"

Will Rogers portrayed a small time lecturer exposing

the behind the scenes secrets of Hollywood before

a popeyed gullible audience in some

remote and forgotten hamlet.

This give Will a wonderful opportunity to

parody the biggest stars of the far off time

and the most successful of then current pictures.

Smack into Sherwood Forest jumps Robin Hood,

as played by the immortal Douglas Fairbanks,

whose played in turn by the immortal Will.

The Fairbanks version of Robin Hood was sweeping the

country and crowds everywhere laughed at this timely spoof.

But no one laughed louder than Will Rogers'

good friend Douglas Fairbanks himself.

(cheerful music)

The merry men dance back into the forest

and for the intrepid Robin game to the heartstrings,

only one stunt remains, getting out of his

safety belt and down from that big bad tree.

In reality of course Fairbanks was a great athlete and

Rogers, the ex cowboy, was a pretty fair acrobat himself.

But that just made this little scene all the funnier.

In the '20s a wide brimmed hat and checkered shirt

meant Tom Mix, a misunderstood hero who was forever

being chased by the Sheriff's posse.

Tom was brave, nonchalant, true blue

and, oh yes, game to the heartstrings.

(horse neighs)

The occasional blemishes on the screen during

this short sequence are not spots before your eyes,

the original negative of this 35 year old classic

was already partially decomposed when it was reprinted.

To preserve for posterity what is probably

the last existing record of Will Roger's

considerable prowess as a trick rider.

(gunshots bang)

Tom Mix swings this away.

The posse swings that a way and heads for

Crouse Myers Canyon, the bottom of it.

At this point Tom would have ridden into the sunset,

if it hadn't been the middle of the afternoon.

Behind that wall of feet lurks Will Rogers

as Ford Sterling, chief of the original Keystone Cops.

While law and order snooze Metaphor the maid is

reading Three Weeks when Mad Morris puts

the snatch on her purse.

In those days you hired a nursemaid to tickle

and a dog to mind the baby.

Mad Morris is gaining so Metaphor

puts in a call to the police.

To pad his part the old time comedian could

produce a whole dictionary of motions

just to answer the phone.

Here in reasonable facsimile come the Keystone Cops,

led by their intrepid commander brave, swift

and gallant and you named it, game to the heartstrings.

In this little episode we come full circle

as Rogers kids Sterling, Roach kids Sennett

and comedy kids comedy.

(boisterous music)

When the Keystone Cops were on the loose

it was no fit time for man, beast or bakery shop.

(boisterous music)

The plot thickens as it develops that Mad Morris

is the ringleader of a band of desperate Tin Lizzies.

(gunshots boom)

The Lizzies wheel about, in a twinkling the pursuers

become the pursued and across a forlorn forgotten field

on a day so long ago Will Rogers runs away into memory.

(soft music)

Out trots the track team of fair Sunnydale College

and in the ranks a girl not to be forgotten,

one destined for stardom, Carol Lombard.

Carol would rather powder than train

and this disturbs her coach Daphne Pollard.

College films were popular in the '20s,

when everybody from baby to grandpop wanted to collegiate.

The big race is announced, proud Sunnydale's hopes

are pinned on Carol.

Daphne holds aloft the starting gun.

(gunshot bangs)

(frantic music)

It was a clean start, Carol running easily

forges to the head of this tight pack of 18 year olds.

Fanny brings up the rear, Carol seems to have it won,

but wait, she's pausing, breaking stride.

Muriel of Pritmore is going past.

Muriel of Pritmore's in the lead

and it's Muriel of Pritmore to win.

Carol place and plenty to show.

Daphne lectures Carol on school spirit, which in the

movies at least is all that college's ever taught.

Now the final event of the afternoon

with the score tied 50 to 50.

Carol's in the lineup with a chance to redeem herself.

The coach's pleadings ring in her ears,

the will to win swells in her breast.

The love for lovely old Sunnydale beats in her heart.

Her boyfriend cheers in the stands but even so

Carol's having a rough time taking those hurdles.

(frantic music)

Now with the hurdles behind Carol's coming fast.

She's past the pack, she's neck and neck with the leader.

They're matching stride for stride.

Carol's edging forward and she's over the line, the winner!

Oh what a glorious day for Sunndydale.

Behind the celebrants a chain forms to grow ever

longer and whirl ever faster.

But all things must go and soon it will be gone

as the age of flappers and flaming youth is gone.

And a girl Jane Peters, who became Carol Lombard

and who loved life so well and died so tragically.

(uplifting music)

The lights of Broadway glow in the descending night,

the Broadway of 1929.

A cab pulls up before a swank hotel.

Two doormen named Laurel and Hardy bobble about,

but look inside that cab, perhaps you recognize the girl?

This bit player is to become one of the most

publicized women in the world.

Her platinum hair, exquisite figure and breezy manner

are to create a new kind of movie heroine, the first of a

glamorous line that includes today's Marilyn Monroe.

Her name, Jean Harlow.

Her role in this Hal Roach comedy called "Double Whoopee"

was small but it was a kind of role you couldn't

help noticing and she filled it so well.

It provided Jean Harlow with her first real break.

(quirky music)

Though our subject is comedy grow serious we must,

for we are about to meet the most versatile of actors,

a man of a thousand roles, all of them different.

And a thousand faces, all of them the same.

A man who could make Barrymore blush

and von Stroheim grow pale.

Behind that final towel lurks Ben Turpin.

Here Turpin plays one of his most famous characterizations,

that at of Rodney St Clair,

the international playboy and heartbreaker.

In real life however Ben was staunchly conservative.

He bought an apartment house and though his salary rose

to $1,500 a week he got up early each morning to act

as janitor before riding the street car to work.

At this time a scene from "The Merry Widow"

was shocking America, in it John Gilbert made love

while blindfolded musicians played.

And if John Gilbert could have

blindfolded musicians so could Ben Turpin.

Lulled by the sweet strains Rodney St Clair glides

into a dance called "My Revere",

for music has charms to soothe the savage beast.

Later across town an irate husband thinks that

worm Rodney has been nibbling at the apple of his eye.

"He'll not come around here again.", the husband mutters.

Is he always to escape scot free,

that mad irresistible adventurer Rodney St Clair?

Glockenspielgudge was the kind of a town where a man

could fall into trouble in his sleep.

(snores)

The scourge of this clapboard

metropolis was Mobrey the Ombre and his outlaw band.

Mobrey feared but one man and here he comes racing to

the rescue, Perona Pete, the pint sized peril.

Formerly a teller in a piggy bank.

Perona rode tall in the saddle by standing up.

(gunshots bang)

Movie fans don't be fooled, behind that clever disguise

is Ben Turpin as the traditional western hero.

Gary Cooper, Gene Audrey, Roy Rogers,

Ben taught them all they know.

Girls get out the handkerchiefs.

In his next role Ben plays a mere man willing

to sacrifice all for a woman.

Innocent Ben tells Slippery Harry Griffin that he'll

confess to save little Nell,

yet Slippery's the real culprit.

In charges Ben, "I did it!", he shouts,

"How much is missing, 10, 20?"

"The cash register is $50,000 short.", say's the sergeant.

"And you look guilty to me!"

Ben turns to Nell, "Scram you crummy crook.", she whimpers.

It's the unkindest cut of all.

"You'll hang for this!", growls the Sergeant

and by George so he does.

While Ben's nursing a sore throat in creeps

Slippery to steal Nell like he stole the dough.

"Come with me to Hoboken.", he mutters.

But the police have overheard,

in the good old days justice was swift.

"You'll honeymoon in Hoboken,", says Ben,

"but you'll honeymoon with me."

Now an episode of clear cultural delight,

Ben Turpin as mythology's great god Pan, come to earth

to prance through woodline glade with a mortal woman.

As the old wives tell it, this dance can only take place

when St Swithun's Day follows Michaelmas Monday

in the green hills of Grunt.

What grace, what poetry, what avant garde surrealism.

Ah, back to grim reality and Ben Turpin on the run

as Fearless Noodnick, the movie stuntman.

At his heels is an insistent camera crew

which wants him for a scene they're shooting.

Fearless is 39 years old.

If he keeps on running he may someday be 40.

"Wow!", says Fearless, "I've fallen into heaven."

But the camera crew has him and heaven was never like this.

Fearless is giving a sterling performance when director

Harry Griffin learns there's a real fire in town.

In the early days film companies would rush to

the scenes of actual fires, floods, earthquakes and parades,

push their actors into the action

and write stories to fit later.

Here by the way is another for the memory books,

a horse drawn fire engine.

(bell rings)

Fearless is getting lonely when along come

a playful cat and dog to keep him company.

(dramatic music)

(cat cries)

Off go cat and dog to caper elsewhere

but Ben's staying put.

Luckily there's an air hose just within reach.

Meanwhile arrive at the fire the director

gives Irene Lentz, as the leading lady,

a prop baby and tells her to run into the smoke and flames.

The firemen make trouble,

"The nerve of them bums!", yells the director,

"They'll spoil the shot!"

And so as he sinks into the deep

we bid a fond farewell to Ben Turpin.

On a hot crowded summer Sunday Laurel and Hardy

pull out of a line of cars into what some film

historians believe is one of the funniest

short comedies ever made.

It was produced by Hal Roach in 1928.

It's supervising director was Leo McCarey,

who went on to win Academy Awards for

"The Awful Truth" and "Going My Way."

It's photographer was George Stevens, who turned

director himself and created "Shane" and "Giant."

It's title was "Two Tars."

Yes that's Edgar Kennedy.

Stan and Oliver as sailors on shore leave

have taken up with fast women in slow traffic.

We needn't say more for like most great

silent comedies "Two Tars" speaks for itself.

(engines rev and clank)

(humorous music)

The old time movie makers knew how to begin

with a simple believable situation,

then build and build until the whole world

seemed caught in a special kind of insanity.

This one is building like an atomic chain reaction.

Notice the way that Laurel and Hardy fever spreads

to the second line of cars,

where pipsqueak battles with truck driver.

(humorous music)

In steps a leader of men,

"Come on, move on boys, move on!"

(humorous music)

The crowd, hot and impatient, demands,

"Get that junk off the highway!"

(crowd shouts)

Upon this Sunday scene happens a perplexed policeman.

One look at the uniform and the girls silently melt away.

(foreboding music)

(whistle blows)

"Who started this?!", asked the cop.

"The sailors did!", answers the crowd.

"Uh huh," say's the cop, "a couple of trouble makers.

"You birds are under arrest,

"now the rest of you move out of here!"

(foreboding music)

The little devils.

(comical music)

"Alright wise guys," says the law,

"Get going, and no funny business.

"I'll be right behind yah see.

"Follow them sailors!

(comical music)

"Follow them sailors!

(comical music)

"Everybody, follow them sailors!

"Follow them sailors!"

"Sorry officer, she blew."

(dramatic music)

A train hurtles through the night,

carrying in an upper berth one of the funniest

yet certainly the saddest of all screen comedians,

the unforgettable Harry Langdon.

Below his new bride gets set for slumber,

for Harry's on his honeymoon, an event which apparently

hasn't in the least ruffled the infantile

innocence of this most unique of clowns,

who one critic said had the face of a fiendish baby.

(quirky music)

Harry faces up to the perils of the Pullman

with a savoir faire of a three year old

cast adrift in a hostile kindergarten.

Langdon's style was completely intuitive.

In real life he was almost as child like

as the character he portrayed,

and he rarely knew the plot of the picture he was making.

Yet today, long after his passing, he is remembered

as one of the four greatest comedians in the

60 year history of the motion picture.

(quirky music)

His bride's thirsty, the little darlin'

and so begins the next chapter of the

horrible honeymoon hazards of Harry.

(quirky music)

Skittering before the approaching conductor

Harry opens the front or windy end

of the old type Pullman and looses a hurricane.

(wind whistles)

Comes the dawn, the passengers gather themselves together

like shipwrecked castaways on a storm swept isle

and Harry's off to the train dressing room.

While his colleagues race through elaborate gags

at breakneck pace, Langdon moved hesitantly

through situations that were both simple and human.

Of him it has been said that he could do more with

less than any other comedian.

(quirky music)

Harry could make returning to his seat an achievement

roughly comparable to scaling Mount Everest.

(quirky music)

In comes the Sheriff with the meanest, toughest,

prisoner in all the land, Hardman Hank, arrested for murder.

Langdon looks at him with a gaze of a youngster

confronted by the boogie man.

(dramatic music)

On a handcar alongside the speeding train

races Hardman's pal in a daring plot to help him escape.

"Hold onto this bird," shouts the Sherrif,

"I'll run out and nab his buddy."

(quirky music)

"Don't worry palsy," confides Hardman,

"Everything's taken care of,

"we'll blast our way out of this together."

(gunshots bang)

This short film was made by Harry Langdon in 1924

when he was at the threshold of international success.

Within five years his comedy instincts seemed to fail

and he rode a rough toboggan to obscurity,

heartbreak and an early death.

A close associate summed it up.

"The little fellow was the most tragic figure

"I ever came across in show business."

In the Golden Age a happy source of humor

was the animal comedy.

This form of fun lives on today only in the movie cartoon,

where because it is far less realistic

it is also far less amusing.

One of the most hilarious animal episodes ever put on film

was this nightmarish encounter between a tail tied lion

and apron string tied family man named Charlie Chase.

(comical music)

(lion roars)

(comical music)

(soft music)

Clyde ran out of human companions for checkers,

he called on the family cat and he also showed

why cats aren't used more often for this purpose,

they're too darn good.

(upbeat music)

"That lame cat, I'll cut down on her milk."

Cameo, the Max Sennett dog, never played poker with the

boys but he was the canine kibitzer in all of Canarsie.

Slippery Harry Griffin, the villain of this piece

looks at his hand and discovers he's just an ace

away from a royal flush.

Of course Slippery could draw for it

but that would be the hard way.

And besides he just happens to have on in his shoe.

Billy Bevan, whose Cameo's master, tell his dog

to sneak a hound's eye look at Griffin's cards.

Slippery Harry's slick and quick

but Cameo's slicker and quicker.

(comical music)

Nix, nix boss.

Nix, nix.

(unintelligible whispers)

Griffin's being outwitted by an adversary with

short hair, big spots and a sawed off tail.

"Get that mutt Mata Hari out of here!",

snarls the outraged Slippery.

Under the table Cameo works his wicked wiles.

(comical music)

It's the switcheroo, the old army game, doggone.

(comical music)

Slippery smiles with that smug security

that comes only to he who holds the top hand in the deck.

All bets are down and that's every buck in the joint.

"You go first.", say's the gallant Griffin.

"Just a minute," say's Slippery,

"10 of diamonds, jack of diamonds, queen of diamonds,

"king of diamonds and three of clubs?"

Kewpie Morgan, whose Billy's silent partner, counts the take

but Hades hath no fury like the cheater cheated.

Wham!

Kewpie saves the money and Cameo tries to save Billy

by putting the bite on Slippery Harry.

There goes Billy to rendezvous by the old hook rug.

(mischievous music)

"Ah, there you are!", says Harry,

"Just in time for another facial massage."

Cameo appraises the situation.

His teeth are tired and it's hard to get a grip

on Giffin's shiny pants, he's got to get help.

(dog barks)

When Cameo digs into a matter pity the petulant policeman,

dirt's getting splattered all over a member of

that illustrious core called the Keystone Cops.

The law's plum tuckered out

but Cameo knows how to apply whiplash of icy indignity

and the chase is really on.

One cop mightn't be enough muses Cameo,

I'd better bring reinforcements.

In the '20's, when this film was made, a dog called

Rin Tin Tin was one of the most successful stars in film.

Little Cameo was never to reach the heights of movie fame

but he could do everything that Rinny could and maybe more.

Why Rin Tin Tin never snatched a skirt in his life.

(dramatic music)

(bell rings)

(unintelligible shouts)

(dramatic music)

Cameo's brought help alright, the entire police force,

but this rescue's worse than the peril.

Billy decides he'd rather be punched than pinched.

Kewpie drops the bag and out flies the money,

smack onto the back of a passing turtle on

it's way to Schlapcole's Lake.

Of course Kewpie knows from nothing that don't cough

but Cameo has spotted the whole thing.

He'll save that bundle of fives before

Abe Lincoln gets his beard wet.

(dog barks)

Nearby policeman relax from pounding their beat

by beating their feet and who should

pop onto the track but the unholy three.

(gunshots bang)

The boys decide to make up and divide the dough,

which by now may be floating in a bowl of turtle soup.

But no, three slickers turned suckers stare in horror

as little Cameo writes the perfect end to this story,

by proving that maybe the world should go to the dogs.

Down that inevitable street, which became so familiar

to movie goers it seemed to be their own hometown,

strolled two past the have musicians,

Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.

Put Laurel and Hardy on a simple street

and anything can happen.

(quirky music)

Like almost all the Laurel and Hardys this film

was produced by Hal Roach, who started with

Universal Pictures as an inexperienced actor in 1913.

By the next year in those fast moving times

Roach owned his own company, which continues

in the family down to the present day.

(quirky music)

"Now watch where you're going.", says Oliver.

(quirky music)

Aha, a music lover.

The disappointments of the day prove too much

for poor Oliver and it's all Stanley's fault.

(quirky music)

Flat.

(quirky music)

The curtain lowers, the clowns depart, hail and farewell.

We will never see their like again.

This is the end of a memory.

(sweeping music)