Just Rambling Along is a
1918 American silent comedy film featuring
Stan Laurel.
Stanley "
Stan" Laurel (born
Arthur Stanley Jefferson, 16 June 1890 --
23 February 1965), was an
English comic actor, writer and film director, famous as one half of the comedy team
Laurel and Hardy.
Laurel began his career in the
British music hall where he took a number of his standard comic devices: the bowler hat, the deep comic gravity, and the nonsensical understatement. He was a member of "
Fred Karno's
Army" where he was
Charlie Chaplin's understudy. The two arrived in the US on the same boat from
Britain with the Karno troupe. His film acting career stretched between
1917 and 1951 and included a starring role in the
Academy Award winning film
The Music Box (1932).
In
1961, Laurel was given a
Lifetime Achievement Academy Award for his pioneering work in comedy. He has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7021
Hollywood Blvd. In a
2005 UK poll to find
The Comedians'
Comedian, Laurel and Hardy ranked top among best double acts and seventh overall. In 2009, a bronze statue of the duo was unveiled in Laurel's hometown of
Ulverston, Cumbria.
In this film as in the later
A Man About Town, some of the humor comes from
Stan's efforts to chase after the girl and the girl's efforts to rid herself of him. On this occasion they wind up in a cafeteria, which provides Stan with opportunities for comic business using food, table implements, etc. The gags seem random, as if improvised while the cameras were grinding. Stan borrows
Chaplin's bit from the restaurant scene in
The Immigrant, using salt & pepper shakers as binoculars, but when
Charlie performed the gag it felt appropriate (he was making fun of
Henry Bergman's florid gestures) whereas here it just feels forced; Stan's doing it because he needs to do something funny. Somewhat better is the routine where Stan samples almost all the food on offer, but then orders only a cup of coffee. Just Rambling Along is of moderate interest for silent comedy buffs, but serves primarily as evidence that Stan needed the partnership with
Oliver Hardy to fully come into his own.
Casting notes: according to one reference source the cook behind the counter is
Charley Chase, but may be
Charley's look-alike brother
James Parrott, sometimes known as
Paul Parrott, who later starred in his own solo series of short comedies and eventually directed some of
Laurel & Hardy's best films. The big cop who chases after Stan is
Noah Young, who was featured in a number of
Harold Lloyd shorts and features, while the chef is played by
Bud Jamison, a rotund character actor who played in support of every major comedian of the era: everyone from Chaplin, Langdon and Keaton to the
Three Stooges. Stan and Bud have a nice scene together in this film, and at one
point Stan appears to break character and laugh at something Bud has said.
Stan Laurel - Nervy
Young Man
Clarine Seymour -
Pretty Lady
Noah Young -
Policeman
James Parrott -
Cook
Bud Jamison -
Chef
Bunny Bixby
Mary Burns
Harry Clifton
Helen Fletcher
Max Hamburger
Wallace Howe
Bert Jefferson
Alma Maxim
Belle Mitchell
Herb Morris
Marie Mosquini
William Petterson
Hazel Powell
Lillian Rothchild
Adu Sanders
Emmy Wallace
Dorothea Wolbert
Directed by
Hal Roach
Produced by
Hal Roach
Cinematography
Robert Doran
Editing by
Thomas J. Crizer
Release date(s)
3 November 1918
Resources: wikipedia.org, imdb.com
New soundtrack and dubbing: Cinemateca
Music:
Kevin Mac Leod (incompetch.com) licensed under
Creative Commons licence:
Attribution 3.0 Unported (
CC BY 3.0).
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
3.0/
- published: 09 Sep 2013
- views: 43444