Image of the Week – 16 April 2024

We are spoilt for choice this week as both The Music Box and Way Out West were released on this day (16 April in 1932 and 1937 respectively). As we shared a still from The Music Box last year, this time, perhaps it should be the turn of Way Out West.

You will of course recall this scene form Way Out West, but can you see what is unusual, perhaps even wrong with this still? The answer is at the bottom of this short piece.

Possibly Laurel and Hardy’s most loved feature film, this masterpiece has everything. From laugh-out-loud comedy to surrealism. From classic musical interludes to inspired dancing. From irony to pathos and from failure to a happy ending. You will know the plot, so lets look at some trivia:

The running gag where Ollie falls into a pot hole in the creek was shot in Sherwood Forest, so named as Douglas Fairbanks Jr. had used the locale for his 1922 production of Robin Hood.

The film’s score was composed by T. Marvin Hatley and nominated for an Academy Award for Best Music (Scoring). Hatley had previously composed Stan and Ollies ‘signature tune’ Ku-Ku, and was the Hal Roach studios musical director. He would say years later that despite his reputation as being a good boss, the only time that producer Mr Roach ever spoke to him was to comment “Cute music! Cute music!” after viewing some of the newly scored footage in a projection room.

The film includes two well-known songs: firstly Macdonald and Carroll’s delightful ‘Trail of the Lonesome Pine’, sung by Ollie with some harmonies by Stan, as well as a few lines dubbed by Chill Wills and Rosina Lawrence (that Stan lip-synched to for glorious comedic effect), and J. Leubrie Hill’s “At the Ball, That’s All”, sung by the Avalon Boys and accompanied by Laurel and Hardy performing an extended dance routine, one that they rehearsed endlessly.

‘Trail of the Lonesome Pine was released as a single in Britain in 1975, with a ‘B’ side of ‘Honolulu Baby’ from Sons of the Desert; it reached number 2 in the British charts, only being kept off the top spot by ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ by Queen.

The 2018 biopic Stan & Ollie opens with a wonderful continuous shot which depicts Stan (Steve Coogan) and Babe (John C. Reilly) in their dressing room and walking to the Way Out West set to shoot the dance scenes in from of the saloon, Mickey Finn’s Palace.

And Finally: Did you figure out what is wrong with the image? Well done if you did. The scene occurs when Mickey Finn has finally locked the deed to the goldmine in his safe and Ollie is initially pleased that the sheriff has turned up. But then he realises the he is one and the same as the husband of the lady (Vivien Oakland) he had annoyed on the stagecoach “all the way in”. The still features Stanley ‘Tiny’ Sandford as the Sheriff, but it isn’t Tiny that appeared in the released version of Way Out West (apart from in a couple of long shots). He was replaced by Stanley Fields when it was thought his diction was a problem – him having lost several teeth. Sandford had not looked after his gnashers and by 1937, they were in a bad way and his dialogue could be difficult to understand.

Thanks to Randy Skretvedt for some of the above and we hope you enjoyed this wonderful image and the Way Out West information. If you have any thoughts or questions, please feel free to leave them in the reply/comments box below. We’d love to hear from you and your comment will receive a response on this page

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