"The untold story of the world's greatest comedy act."
With their golden era long behind them, comedy duo Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy embark on a variety hall tour of Britain and Ireland. Despite the pressures of a hectic schedule, and with the support of their wives Lucille and Ida – a formidable double act in their own right – the pair's love of performing, as well as for each other, endures as they secure their place in the hearts of their adoring public
Steve Coogan
Stanley "Stan" Laurel
John C. Reilly
Oliver "Ollie" Hardy
Shirley Henderson
Lucille Hardy
Nina Arianda
Ida Kitaeva Laurel
Rufus Jones
Bernard Delfont
Danny Huston
Hal Roach
Joseph Balderrama
James W. Horne
John Henshaw
Nobby Cook
Keith MacPherson
James Finlayson
With their golden era long behind them, comedy duo Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy embark on a variety hall tour of Britain and Ireland. Despite the pressures of a hectic schedule, and with the support of their wives Lucille and Ida – a formidable double act in their own right – the pair's love of performing, as well as for each other, endures as they secure their place in the hearts of their adoring public
This movie tells a simple story beautifully about two complex men at the end of their careers. I think I disagree with some people in believing that Stan & Ollie benefits from narrowing the plot. Showing their career together at their pear would show what they were as a team and what they did together, but this angle illustrates who they are. It sweats the details. Coogan and Reilly are very convincing in their roles. They still have ambitions that fuel an attempt at a comeback, but their ambition is clouded by the knowledge that they are past their prime. They enjoy the nostalgia and leftover love from their fans even while they try to rise above it. The movie is able to end on a high note even though they cannot achieve all of their goals. Perhaps what I like the most about this movie is the treatment of the stars' wives. As the agent character states, the two wives are also a sort of double act. On the surface they don't seem to like each other a lot, but we see moments of respect and fun between them, and they obviously both love their famous husbands very much. As I said above, Coogan and Reilly do a great job in this movie, but it would have been a lesser film without these two supporting characters.
As a kid, i always shied away from the sort of "slapstick" humour of Laurel and Hardy, so I knew little about them. This little retrospective proved to be an enjoyable traipse throughout their last few professional years, down on their luck, working for a somewhat unscrupulous Bernard (later Lord) Delfont from small, provincial, music halls in Britain. John C. Reilly does an excellent job conveying the frailties of Oliver Hardy. Steve Coogan is less convincing - he seems to resort more to mimicry. All-in-all, though - quite an charming and gently told story with quite a few laughs and the odd tear-jerking moment, too.
Fledgling comic Benjy Stone can't believe his luck when his childhood hero, the swashbuckling matinee idol Alan Swann, gets booked to appear on the variety show he writes for. But when Swann arrives, he fails to live up to his silver screen image. Instead, he's a drunken womanizer who suffers from stage fright. Benjy is assigned to look after him before the show, and it's all he can do to keep his former idol from going completely off the rails.
On the evening of March 31, 1943, legendary lyricist Lorenz Hart confronts his shattered self-confidence in Sardi’s bar as his former collaborator, Richard Rodgers, celebrates the opening night of his ground-breaking hit musical, “Oklahoma!”
Two street basketball hustlers try to con each other, then team up for a bigger score.
Duncan is a genius straight A student, Blade is ajuvenile delinquent. But because of a mix up with their school records, everyone thinks each is the other one. Now, Duncan kind of likes the attention from being thought of as a real bad dude, if only the school bully would stop trying to rough him up. And Blade definitely likes being thought of as important instead of as trouble.
A dramatization of the relationship between heart surgery pioneers Alfred Blalock and Vivien Thomas.
Thirty years after starring in 'The Wizard of Oz', beloved actress and singer Judy Garland arrives in London to perform sold-out shows at the Talk of the Town nightclub. While there, she reminisces with friends and fans and begins a whirlwind romance with musician Mickey Deans, her soon-to-be fifth husband.
In what would cause a fantastic media frenzy, Clifford Irving sells his bogus biography of Howard Hughes to a premiere publishing house in the early 1970s.
International art dealer Ron Hall must befriend a dangerous homeless man in order to save his struggling marriage to his wife, a woman whose dreams will lead all three of them on the journey of their lives.
A wheelchair-bound singer and her best friend embark on a roadtrip to Memphis.
The true story of the relationship between Alan Bennett and the singular Miss Shepherd, a woman of uncertain origins who ‘temporarily’ parked her van in Bennett’s London driveway and proceeded to live there for 15 years.