“Stan Laurel”的意思、由来-开放百科全书

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.^[2]^[2] He and Chaplin arrived in the United States on the same ship from the United Kingdom with the Karno troupe.^[3] Laurel began his film career in 1917 and made his final appearance in 1951. From 1928 onwards, he appeared exclusively with Hardy. Laurel officially retired 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. Laurel and Hardy ranked top among best double acts and seventh overall in a 2005 UK poll to find the Comedians' Comedian.^[6] In 2009, a bronze statue of the duo was unveiled in Laurel's home town of Ulverston.

Early life

Arthur Stanley Jefferson was born in his grandparents' house on 16 June 1890 in Argyll Street, Ulverston, Lancashire, to Arthur Jefferson, a theatre manager from Bishop Auckland, and Margaret (née Metcalfe), an actress from Ulverston. He was one of five children.^[4]

His parents were both active in the theatre and always very busy. In his early years, Laurel spent much time living with his maternal grandmother, Sarah Metcalfe.^[2] He attended school at King James I Grammar School in Bishop Auckland, County Durham,^[5] and the King's School in Tynemouth, Tyne and Wear.^[6]

He moved with his parents to Glasgow, Scotland, where he completed his education at Rutherglen Academy. His father managed Glasgow's Metropole Theatre, where Laurel began work. His boyhood hero was Dan Leno, one of the greatest English music hall comedians.^[2] With a natural affinity for the theatre, Laurel gave his first professional performance on stage at the Panopticon in Glasgow at the age of sixteen, where he polished his skills at pantomime and music hall sketches.^[7] It was the music hall from where he drew his standard comic devices, including his bowler hat and nonsensical understatement.^[2]

He joined Fred Karno's troupe of actors in 1910 with the stage name of "Stan Jefferson"; the troupe also included a young Charlie Chaplin. The music hall nurtured him, and he acted as Chaplin's understudy for some time.^[2]^[2] Karno was a pioneer of slapstick, and in his biography Laurel stated, "Fred Karno didn't teach Charlie [Chaplin] and me all we know about comedy. He just taught us most of it".^[8] Chaplin and Laurel arrived in the United States on the same ship from Britain with the Karno troupe and toured the country.^[3]

During the First World War, Laurel registered for military service in America on 5 June 1917, as required under the Selective Service Act. He was not called up; his registration card states resident alien and deafness as exemptions.^[9]^[10]

Between 1916 and 1918, he teamed up with Alice Cooke and Baldwin Cooke, who became his lifelong friends. Amongst other performers, Laurel worked briefly alongside Oliver Hardy in the silent film short The Lucky Dog (1921),^[4] before the two were a team. It was around this time that Laurel met Mae Dahlberg. Around the same time, he adopted the stage name of Laurel at Dahlberg's suggestion that his stage name Stan Jefferson was unlucky, due to it having thirteen letters.{{#tag:ref|Laurel disputed this and claimed that it just "sounded good".^[11]|group=N}} the pair were performing together when Laurel was offered $75 a week to star in two-reel comedies. After making his first film Nuts in May, Universal offered him a contract. The contract was soon cancelled during a reorganisation at the studio. Among the films in which Dahlberg and Laurel appeared together was the 1922 parody Mud and Sand.

By 1924, Laurel had given up the stage for full-time film work, under contract with Joe Rock for 12 two-reel comedies. The contract had one unusual stipulation: that Dahlberg was not to appear in any of the films. Rock thought that her temperament was hindering Laurel's career. In 1925, she started interfering with Laurel's work, so Rock offered her a cash settlement and a one-way ticket back to her native Australia, which she accepted.^[12] The 12 two-reel comedies were Mandarin Mix-Up (1924), Detained (1924), Monsieur Don't Care (1924), West of Hot Dog (1924), Somewhere in Wrong (1925), Twins (1925), Pie-Eyed (1925), The Snow Hawk (1925), Navy Blue Days (1925), The Sleuth (1925), Dr. Pyckle and Mr. Pryde (1925) and Half a Man (1925).

Laurel and Hardy

Laurel next signed with the Hal Roach studio, where he began directing films, including a 1926 production called Yes, Yes, Nanette (in which Oliver Hardy had a part under the name "Babe" Hardy). It had been his intention to work primarily as a writer and director.

The same year, Oliver Hardy, another member of the Hal Roach Studios Comedy All Star players, was injured in a kitchen mishap and hospitalised. Because he was unable to work on the scheduled film, Get 'Em Young, Laurel was asked to return to acting to fill in. Starting early in 1927, Laurel and Hardy began sharing the screen in several short films, including Duck Soup, Slipping Wives and With Love and Hisses. The two became friends and their comic chemistry soon became obvious. Roach Studios' supervising director Leo McCarey noticed the audience reaction to them and began teaming them, leading to the creation of the Laurel and Hardy series later that year.

Together, the two men began producing a huge body of short films, including The Battle of the Century, Should Married Men Go Home?, Two Tars, Be Big!, Big Business, and many others. Laurel and Hardy successfully made the transition to talking films with the short Unaccustomed As We Are in 1929. They also appeared in their first feature in one of the revue sequences of The Hollywood Revue of 1929, and the following year they appeared as the comic relief in the lavish all-colour (in Technicolor) musical feature The Rogue Song. Their first starring feature Pardon Us was released in 1931. They continued to make both features and shorts until 1935, including their 1932 three-reeler The Music Box, which won an Academy Award for Best Short Subject.

Trouble at Roach Studio

During the 1930s, Laurel was involved in a dispute with Hal Roach which resulted in the termination of his contract. Roach maintained separate contracts for Laurel and Hardy that expired at different times, so Hardy remained at the studio and was "teamed" with Harry Langdon for the 1939 film Zenobia. The studio discussed a series of films co-starring Hardy with Patsy Kelly to be called "The Hardy Family." But Laurel sued Roach over the contract dispute. Eventually, the case was dropped and Laurel returned to Roach. The first film that Laurel and Hardy made after Laurel returned was A Chump at Oxford. Subsequently, they made Saps at Sea, which was their last film for Roach.

Second World War

In 1941, Laurel and Hardy signed a contract at 20th Century-Fox to make ten films over five years. Laurel found, to his shock, that he and Hardy were hired only as actors, and were not expected to contribute to the staging, writing, or editing of the productions. When the films proved very successful, Laurel and Hardy were granted more freedom and gradually added more of their own material. They had made six Fox features when the studio suddenly abandoned B-picture production in December 1944. The team had signed another contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1942, resulting in two more features.^[13]

Revisiting his music hall days, Laurel returned to England in 1947 when he and Hardy went on a six-week tour of the United Kingdom performing in variety shows.^[14] Mobbed wherever they went, Laurel's homecoming to Ulverston took place in May, and the duo were greeted by thousands of fans outside the Coronation Hall.^[25] The Evening Mail noted: "Oliver Hardy remarked to our reporter that Stan had talked about Ulverston for the past 22 years and he thought he had to see it."^[15] The tour included a Royal Variety Performance in front of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in London.^[15] The success of the tour led them to spend the next seven years touring the UK and Europe.

Around this time, Laurel found out that he had diabetes, so he encouraged Hardy to find solo projects, which he did, taking parts in John Wayne and Bing Crosby films.

In 1950, Laurel and Hardy were invited to France to make a feature film. The film was a disaster, a Franco-Italian co-production titled Atoll K. (The film was entitled Utopia in the US and Robinson Crusoeland in the UK.) Both stars were noticeably ill during the filming. Upon returning to the United States, they spent most of their time recovering. In 1952, Laurel and Hardy toured Europe successfully, and they returned in 1953 for another tour of the continent. During this tour, Laurel fell ill and was unable to perform for several weeks.^[16]

In May 1954, Hardy had a heart attack and cancelled the tour. In 1955, they were planning to do a television series called Laurel and Hardy's Fabulous Fables based on children's stories. The plans were delayed after Laurel suffered a stroke on 25 April 1955, from which he recovered. But as the team was planning to get back to work, his partner Hardy had a massive stroke on 14 September 1956, which resulted in his being unable to return to acting.

Hardy's death

Oliver Hardy died on 7 August 1957. Laurel was too ill to attend his funeral and said, "Babe would understand".^[17] People who knew Laurel said that he was devastated by Hardy's death and never fully recovered from it. He refused to perform on stage or act in another film without his friend,^[17] although he continued to socialise with his fans.

After Laurel and Hardy

In 1961, Stan Laurel was given a Lifetime Achievement Academy Award for his pioneering work in comedy. He had achieved his lifelong dream as a comedian and had been involved in nearly 190 films. He lived his final years in a small flat in the Oceana Apartments in Santa Monica, California.^[18]

Laurel was always gracious to fans and spent much time answering fan mail. His phone number was listed in the telephone directory, and fans were amazed that they could dial the number and speak to him directly.

Jerry Lewis was among the numerous comedians to visit Laurel, who offered suggestions for Lewis' production of The Bellboy (1960). Lewis paid tribute to Laurel by naming his main character Stanley in the film, and having Bill Richmond play a version of Laurel as well.^[19] Dick Van Dyke told a similar story. When he was just starting his career, he looked up Laurel's phone number, called him, and then visited him at his home. Van Dyke played Laurel on "The Sam Pomerantz Scandals" episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show.

Laurel was offered a cameo role in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), but turned it down. He did not want to be on screen in his old age,^[3] especially without Hardy.

Personal life

Laurel and Mae Dahlberg never married but lived together as common-law husband and wife from 1919 to 1925, before Dahlberg accepted a one-way ticket from Joe Rock to go back to her native Australia.^[20] In November 1937, Dahlberg was back in the USA and sued Laurel for financial support. At the time, Laurel's second marriage was in the process of a divorce, with Dahlberg's legal suit adding to Laurel's woes. The matter was settled out of court.^[21] Dahlberg was described as a "relief project worker" by the court.

Laurel had four wives and married one of them a second time after their divorce.^[22] His first wife was Lois Neilson, whom he married on 13 August 1926. Their daughter Lois was born on 10 December 1927 during the early years of Laurel and Hardy's partnership. In May 1930, their son Stanley was born two months premature and died after nine days. Laurel's daughter Lois died on 27 July 2017, aged 89.^[23] Laurel and Neilson divorced in December 1934.

In 1935, Laurel married Virginia Ruth Rogers (known as Ruth). In 1937, he filed for divorce, confessing that he was not over his ex-wife Lois, but Lois decided against a reconciliation. On New Year's Day 1938, Laurel married Vera Ivanova Shuvalova (known as Illeana), and Ruth accused him of bigamy, but their divorce had been finalised a couple of days before his new marriage. The new marriage was very volatile, and Illeana accused him of trying to bury her alive in the backyard of their San Fernando Valley home.^[24] He and Illeana separated in 1939 and divorced in 1940, with Illeana surrendering all claim to the Laurel surname on 1 February 1940 in exchange for $6,500.^[25] In 1941, Laurel remarried Virginia Ruth Rogers; they were divorced for the second time in early 1946.^[22] On 6 May 1946, he married Ida Kitaeva Raphael to whom he remained married until his death.^[22]

Death

Laurel was a heavy smoker until suddenly quitting around 1960.^[26] In January 1965, he underwent a series of x-rays for an infection on the roof of his mouth.^[27] He died on 23 February 1965, aged 74, four days after suffering a heart attack on 19 February.^[28] Minutes before his death, he told his nurse that he would not mind going skiing, and she replied that she was not aware that he was a skier. "I'm not," said Laurel, "I'd rather be doing that than this!" A few minutes later he died quietly in his armchair.^[29]

At his funeral, Buster Keaton said, "Chaplin wasn't the funniest, I wasn't the funniest, this man was the funniest." Dick Van Dyke gave the eulogy^[30] as a friend, protégé, and occasional impressionist of Laurel during his later years; he read "The Clown's Prayer".^[31] Laurel had quipped, "If anyone at my funeral has a long face, I'll never speak to him again."^[32] He was interred in Forest Lawn–Hollywood Hills Cemetery.^[33]

Legacy and honours

Laurel and Hardy are featured on the cover of the Beatles' 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.^[34] In 1989, a statue of Laurel was erected in Dockwray Square, North Shields, Tyne and Wear, England, where he lived at No. 8 from 1897 to 1902. The steps down from the Square to the North Shields Fish Quay were said to have inspired the piano-moving scene in The Music Box. In a 2005 UK poll, Comedians' Comedian, Laurel and Hardy were ranked top double act, and seventh overall.^[32] Along with Hardy, Laurel was inducted into the Grand Order of Water Rats.^[35]

A plaque on the Bull Inn, Bottesford, Leicestershire, England, marks Laurel and Hardy appearing in Nottingham over Christmas 1952, and staying with Laurel's sister, Olga, who was the landlady of the pub.^[38] In 2008, a statue of Stan Laurel was unveiled in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, on the site of the Eden Theatre.^[39] In April 2009, a bronze statue of Laurel and Hardy was unveiled in Ulverston.^[40]^[41]

There is a Laurel and Hardy Museum in Stan's hometown of Ulverston. There are two Laurel and Hardy museums in Hardy's hometown of Harlem, Georgia. One is operated by the town of Harlem, and the other is a private museum owned and operated by Gary Russeth, a Harlem resident.

In 2013, Gail Louw and Jeffrey Holland debuted a short one-man play "...And this is my friend Mr Laurel" at the Camden Fringe festival. The play, starring Holland as Laurel, was taken on tour of the UK in 2014 until June 2015.^[42]

In a 2018 film, Stan & Ollie, Laurel is played by English comedian Steve Coogan, and Hardy by American actor John C. Reilly.^[43] Developed by BBC Films, the film is set in the twilight of their careers, and focuses on their farewell tour of Britain & Ireland's variety halls in 1953.

Filmography

See also

References

Notes

1. ^"Obituary". Variety, 3 March 1965, p. 69.
2. ^¹²³⁴McCabe 2005, p. 143. Robson, 2005 Retrieved: 18 June 2012.
3. ^¹²{{cite web|url=http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/the-fine-mess-maker-at-home/|title=The Fine Mess-Maker at Home|website=New York Times|date=7 September 2012|last=Cavett|first=Dick}}
4. ^¹Midwinter, Eric. "Laurel, Stan". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2006. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
5. ^{{cite web | title=Stan Laurel's former Bishop Auckland school 'left to rot' | website=The Northern Echo | date=4 February 2012 | url=http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/9512813.Stan_Laurel_s_former_Bishop_Auckland_school__left_to_rot_/ | access-date=11 February 2018}}
6. ^{{cite web | title=Stan Laurel letter set to go under the hammer | website=The Northern Echo | date=13 September 2014 | url=http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/local/southdurham/bishopauckland/11471926.Stan_Laurel_letter_set_to_go_under_the_hammer/ | access-date=11 February 2018}}
7. ^Bowers 2007, pp. 143–147.
8. ^{{cite book|last1=Burton|first1=Alan|title=Pimple, pranks & pratfalls: British film comedy before 1930|date=2000|publisher=Flicks Books|page=51}}
9. ^{{cite web|url=http://www.lettersfromstan.com/stan-early-01.html|title=Letters From Stan – 1915–1923|first=Bernie|last=Hogya|website=www.lettersfromstan.com}}
10. ^{{cite web|url=http://www.thebrainydeafsite.com/p3.html|title=P.3|website=TheBrainyDeafSite}}
11. ^McCabe 1961, p. 18.
12. ^Bergan 1992, p. 33.
13. ^MacGillivray, Scott. Laurel & Hardy: From the Forties Forward. Second edition: New York: iUniverse, 2009 {{ISBN|978-1440172397}}; first edition: Lanham, Maryland: Vestal Press, 1998.
14. ^{{cite news |title=Tea and buns with Laurel and Hardy: Derek Malcolm on the day he met his comedy heroes|url=https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/oct/11/tea-and-buns-with-laurel-and-hardy-the-day-i-met-my-comedy-heroes |accessdate=12 November 2018 |work=The Guardian}}
15. ^¹²"Stan at Queen's first Royal Variety Show" {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140201221344/http://www.nwemail.co.uk/memories/stan-at-queen-s-first-royal-variety-show-1.1015949 |date=1 February 2014 }}. North West Evening Mail.
16. ^Bergen 1992, p. 118.
17. ^¹²³⁴Rawlngs, Nate. "Top 10 Across-the-Pond Duos", Time, 20 July 2010. Retrieved: 18 June 2012.
18. ^"Latter." {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120228174300/http://www.lettersfromstan.com/stan_oceana.html |date=28 February 2012 }} The Stan Laurel Correspondence Archive Project. Retrieved: 8 September 2012.
19. ^Brody, Richard. "Front Row: Jerry Lewis, Writer", New Yorker, 5 May 2011. Retrieved 17 May 2011.
20. ^Simon Louvish, Stan and Ollie, The Roots of Comedy, Faber & Faber 2001 {{ISBN|0-571-21590-4}}
21. ^[https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SBS19371207.1.4 San Bernardino Sun, Volume 44, 7 December 1937, Page 4, "Stan Laurels in Agreement"] Accessed 15 April 2017.
22. ^¹²Harnisch, Larry. "Stan Laurel's stormy marriage full of off-screen drama." Los Angeles Times, 21 June 2009. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
23. ^Lois Laurel Hawes, Daughter of Stan Laurel, Dies at 89
24. ^{{cite news|last1=Harnisch|first1=Larry|title=Stormy marriage full of off-screen drama for Stan Laurel|url=http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jun/21/local/me-then21|accessdate=14 April 2018|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|date=21 June 2009}}
25. ^Associated Press, "Surrenders Her Name", The Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington, Friday 2 February 1940, Volume 57, Number 264, page 2.
26. ^"Correspondence: April 4–29, 1964." The Stan Laurel Correspondence Project via lettersfromstan.com. Retrieved: 29 September 2018.
27. ^"Correspondence: January 4–29, 1965." {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110903154327/http://www.lettersfromstan.com/stan_1965-01.html |date=3 September 2011 }} The Stan Laurel Correspondence Project via lettersfromstan.com. Retrieved: 10 August 2011.
28. ^[https://www.nytimes.com/1965/02/24/archives/stan-laurel-dies-i-movie-comedian-teamed-with-oliver-hardy-in-200.html "Stan Laurel Dies. Teamed With Oliver Hardy in 200 Slapstick Films-Played 'Simple' Foil."] The New York Times, 24 February 1965. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
29. ^Bergen 1992, pp. 119–120.
30. ^{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTw0TPv6n1s|title=Raw footage of Stan Laurels funeral with Dick Van Dyke, Buster Keaton and more|first=|last=ebonyivorymovies|date=2 January 2014|publisher=|via=YouTube}}
31. ^{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZRvfn1BCoHwC&pg=PT141&lpg=PT141&dq=Dick+Van+Dyke+a+prayer+for+clowns&source=bl&ots=f-0S_HsdgQ&sig=a3U2zAnu47IevPc7L1CqovPwM0M&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj9_dDlrdbQAhUFwiYKHfEHB1sQ6AEIPzAG#v=onepage&q=Dick+Van+Dyke+a+prayer+for+clowns&f=false|title=My Lucky Life In and Out of Show Business: A Memoir|first=Dick Van|last=Dyke|date=3 May 2011|publisher=Crown/Archetype|via=Google Books}}
32. ^¹²[https://books.google.com/books?id=-h3-oAEoQMYC&pg=PA95 "The Making of Stan Laurel: Echoes of a British Boyhood"], p. 95. McFarland, 2011.
33. ^Wilson, Scott. Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 26901-26907). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.
34. ^Levy 2005, p. 5.
35. ^{{cite web |url= http://www.gowr.co.uk/roll-of-honour/ |title= Roll of Honour |publisher= Grand Order of Water Rats |accessdate= 17 April 2017}}
36. ^{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0076mjl|title=Neil Brand - Stan - BBC Radio 4 Extra|website=BBC}}
37. ^"BBC Four Cinema - Silent Cinema Season." {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060624173712/http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/cinema/features/silent-cinema-season.shtml |date=24 June 2006 }} BBC. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
38. ^"The Battle for Bottesford – the border town of Nottinghamshire and Leicestershire." {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101207081335/http://leicestershire.greatbritishlife.co.uk/article/the-battle-for-bottesford-the-border-town-of-nottinghamshire-and-leicestershire-23520 |date=7 December 2010 }} Leicestershire Magazine, 31 July 2010. Retrieved: 6 October 2010.
39. ^Roberts, Will. "Laurel proves Hardy after disaster delays: Statue of Laurel arrives in Bishop Auckland." thenorthernecho, 13 August 2008. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
40. ^"Statue honours Laurel and Hardy." BBC, 19 April 2009. Retrieved: 20 March 2010.
41. ^[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/5183293/Hundreds-attend-Laurel-and-Hardy-statue-unveiling.html "Hundreds attend Laurel and Hardy statue unveiling"], The Telegraph. Retrieved: 25 July 2012.
42. ^"'...And this is my friend Mr Laurel'", jeffreyholland.co.uk. Retrieved: 2 March 2015.
43. ^{{cite news|title=Steve Coogan and John C. Reilly will be Laurel and Hardy in Stan & Ollie|url=http://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/steve-coogan-john-c-reilly-will-laurel-hardy-stan-ollie/|publisher=Empire magazine|date=18 January 2016}}