Hello Laurel & Hardy friends,
Just a quick reminder that our next film show will be next Wednesday, February 19th, 7.30pm till 10.30pm at our new venue of THE BARGE INN which resides near to the Erewash canal, at 177 Tamworth Rd, Long Eaton, Nottingham NG10 1DH. We are in the upstairs room. There is no car park but there is plenty of street parking.
All are welcome – entry is free.
As we’re in the upper decks of a boating inn next to a fine stretch of water…I just couldn’t help myself and select a series of films with a bit of a maritime theme. In this we will be showing the feature film “Our Relations” from 1936 where we meet Stan & Ollie’s sailor twin brothers, Bert and Alf, who are on shore leave from the SS Periwinkle. This is also being shown in tribute to Tiny Sanford (26th Feb) and Alan Hale Sr (10th feb) whose birthdays it would be this month.
However, our main birthday tribute this month is to Anita Frances Garvin. She was born February 11 1907 in New York City. She appeared in 11 Laurel & Hardy films between 1927 and 1940 and also a number of earlier Stan Laurel solo films. Overall the imdb credits her with a total of 100 film appearances, the last being in 1940 with the Three Stooges. Later, she attended a number of early Laurel & Hardy conventions. She died July 7th 1994 aged 87. I will be showing two of her silent films with Laurel & Hardy, The first will be “Sailors, Beware” from 1927 and, in a one-off, I will show this with a commentary by Randy Skredvedt as he has a lot interesting comments to make on this film and on Anita Garvin. I will also be showing the fully restored version of “The Battle of the Century” from 1927 with that infamous pie fight and Anita’s scene stealing slip up at the end of the film.
Both films will be taken from the recent releases of restored silent films on HD Blu-ray.
In the break I hope to show a short interview that Anita Garvin had with Randy Skredvedt in 1981 where she talks about Laurel & Hardy and that scene.
Stan passed away on February 23rd 1965. We don’t usually commemorate his passing but as it’s exactly 60 years ago, this year I hope to mark this with a few clips of Stan in 1964/5 and a short clip covering his funeral at the Chapel of the Pines in the Forest Lawn cemetery north of Hollywood Stan laurel was cremated and his ashes have been laid to rest in the same cemetery.
Our final film of the evening will be a High Definition version of “Towed in a Hole” from 1932, with the Boys renovating a boat in the boat yard.
There will be the usual raffle – any more unwanted Christmas presents would be gratefully accepted.
Other news…
1. I’ve booked the Bull Inn, Bottesford for our 25 anniversary celebration film show for the afternoon of Saturday June 14th. And, yes, we’ll be visiting the Plough inn and Arthur Jeffesrons grave in the more. All are welcome.
2. On Sunday, February 23rd, at 1pm, the Beau Chumps tent of Sunderland are gathering at the Stan Laurel statue in Dockwray Square in North Shields for the 6oth year commemoration. The event will be attended by other Sons of the Desert and by Keith Woods, Stan Laurel’s grand nephew (ie Olga’s grandson). Denise and I will be going up to represent the tent but everyone is welcome to attend. If you’ve not been there before, its quite a fascinating little town on the coast near Newcastle…you can visit the Laurel statue, see Dockwray Square where a young Stan Laurel used to live (though the buildings have long since gone you can see a plaque on the wall of a house marking where they did live), see the high and low lights off the green mentioned in memoirs and the multitude of step ways down to the fish quay and the fish quay itself….all undoubtedly inspiring plot lines for many Laurel & Hardy films as outlined in Danny Lawrences great book “The Making of Stan Laurel: Echoes of a British Boyhood”. Then there’s the sites of Arthur Jeffersons two theatres. Let me know if you are going up and I’ll be happy to take you around. See attachment below for details.
3. There has been quite a few really fine books come out recently on Laurel & Hardy..many of them quite pricey. But Roger Robinson from the Southend saps tent has just put a good book together for just £16 inclusive of postage.. it is called Pom! Pom! you can read all about this on https://www.bowlerdessert.com
This is definitely worth a punt …mine’s presently in the post.
4. The 1974 Laurel & hardy documentary entitled Omnibus cuckoo: A celebration of Stan Laurel & Oliver Hardy is being aired on BBC4 on Thursday 20th Feb at 22.40hrs. It’s a brilliant documentary narrated by Morecambe and Wise. I believe that this is to be followed by the Stan & Ollie feature film.
You will be pleased to note that this is it…there isn’t anymore!!
So, we hope to see you this forthcoming Wednesday at the Barge. After that our next meet will be Wednesday March 19th. Please bring along your friends and family – all are very welcome.
Fraternally Yours,
Dave T
(Grand Sheikh – Nottingham Beau Hunks tent)Stan & Ollie essay
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