Entertainment Essay, no. 1

This may be cheating, but I thought I’d use this week’s challenge as a way of sharing some of my favourite films, books and television shows. Just about everyone I’ve ever met has done a recent facebook list of ’10 Albums That Changed Me’ or ‘My 7 Best Books EVER’. I hate all that shit, but I’ve always been a keen reader and a real cinephile, so why not see if I can persuade you to cast an eye on some of the things that have brought me real pleasure, or insight, or both, over the course of my life?

Today’s topic:

“WHY DO I LOVE LAUREL & HARDY FILMS 80 YEARS AFTER THEY WERE MADE?”

To me, comedy is not something that can be explained. Trying to work out what will make people laugh is as futile as trying to guess their favourite shape. Some things tickle us, others don’t. Some of us love slapstick, others go for wordplay. All I can say is – whatever style of comedy you love, whatever sitcom or sketch show you have roared at over the past few decades, it almost certainly has its roots back in the 1920s and 30s. Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, The Marx Brothers – these are the people who found the funny in film. I love all those guys and would probably still rather sit through their back catalogues again than see most of what passes as ‘comedy’ in cinema nowadays, but to me Laurel & Hardy were the best. Some of their shorts are almost perfect. I’m not kidding or exaggerating there – I think some of their work is so good that you literally wouldn’t change one frame of it, even if you could. Whatever modern comedians you find hilarious, I would lay a huge bet that they watched Stan & Ollie and were influenced by them. Whatever it is that makes you laugh – they probably did it first and did it best.

But don’t take my word for it. I’m here to share my thoughts, not to convince you of something. I bought the entire Laurel & Hardy collection of shorts and features on DVD for just twenty quid. Most of them are free on YouTube. Watch them. Just watch them. Give up 20 minutes of your time today to view ‘The Music Box’ or ‘Tit for Tat’ or ‘County Hospital’. If you still prefer Adam Sandler, Catherine Tate or Ricky Gervais, so be it. Go back to them and have fun. If you find something you like though, I urge you to look back on Stan and Ollie’s whole output. You may open yourself up to a whole new world of entertainment. You will certainly, I suspect, laugh, and laugh lots. And you will be laughing at something that was created when your grandparents hadn’t even started school.

Think about that, while you’re smiling, and wonder if today’s product will be so accessible and relevant two generations from now?

I’ll leave it there.

RC 12-5-20