In the only film – that we can tell anyway – in which neither Stan nor Ollie appear to survive the ending, The Midnight Patrol was released tomorrow – 03 August – in 1933 and this week’s image is a nice studio publicity still which beautifully illustrates the boys relationship. Want to know more? Clicking on the link above will take you to the relevant page on the main website
Exasperation! Perhaps he had just been told by Stan that the address they needed to be at was “24 Prowler Street. There’s a man trying to steal some walnuts”: Stan having been told there was a prowler at 24 Walnut Avenue!
How about some trivia from The Midnight Patrol?
The Midnight Patrol was the final Laurel and Hardy Comedy of the 1932-33 Season and before its release, went under the working titles Calling Car Thirteen and Calling All Cars.
The two cars featured in the movie are the 1927 Cadillac series 314A for the police car, which was actually owned by Stan at the time, and a 1925 Chevrolet Superior for the street thugs. The Cadillac is still around and can be found in the Melody Ranch Museum in Santa Clarita California (with thanks to Bob Satterfield)
Wow, was that jewel thief dumb? What kind of a decent burglar tries to open a safe merely by banging on the side of it, when a five-year-old would probably know this wouldn’t work; not only that, it would make enough noise to raise the dead! (IMDB)
When Officers Laurel and Hardy are given the address of an attempted burglary from the police station, don’t you think it strange that none in the station realise that it’s the address of the police chief?
The gag from Way Out West where Stan tries to pull Ollies head through the hole in the trapdoor and his neck stretched and snaps back was in the script for The Midnight Patrol but not used.
Interestingly, the previous year, a film Midnight Patrol (Missing the ‘The’ if you see what I mean) was released on April 10, 1932. It is an American drama film, directed by Christy Cabanne. It stars Regis Toomey, Betty Bronson, and Edwina Booth. No? Me neither…
Our thanks as usual to Randy Skretvedt‘s ‘The Magic Behind the Movies’ for several of the items above
The Beau Chumps Tent of Sunderland UK 
I like the stylish credits at the start of this short. As for the ending, the police chief’s final words ‘Send for the coroner’ do seem really final, don’t they?
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Hello Andrew and thanks for your thoughts.
Yes, the credits look to be of a similar ilk to those in Dirty Work, where rather than windscreen wipers clearing the screen for the next title, we get bubbling chemicals!
I agree that the “Send for the coroner” line does have a finality about it which is a little darker than your ‘usual’ Laurel and Hardy ending!
Take care
Mike
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