Stan and Ollie

The Roots of Comedy: The Double Life of Laurel and Hardy

By: Simon Louvish

Narrated by: Shaun Grindell

Length: 17 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

In this audiobook, Simon Louvish traces the early lives of Stanley Jefferson and Norvell Hardy and the surrounding minstrel and variety theater, which influenced all of their later work. Louvish examines the rarely seen solo films of both our heroes, prior to their serendipitous pairing in 1927, in the long-lost short Duck Soup. The inspired casting teamed them until their last days. Both often married, they found balancing their personal and professional lives a nearly impossible feat.

Between 1927 and 1938, they were able to successfully bridge the gap between silent and sound films, which tripped up most of their prominent colleagues. Their Hal Roach and MGM films were brilliant, but their move in 1941 to Twentieth Century Fox proved disastrous, with the nine films made there ranking as some of the most embarrassing moments of cinematic history.

In spite of this, Laurel and Hardy survived as exemplars of lasting genius, and their influence is seen to this day. The clowns were elusive behind their masks, but now Simon Louvish can finally reveal their full and complex humanity, and their passionate devotion to their art. In Stan and Ollie, Louvish has seamlessly woven tireless and thorough research into an authoritative biography of these two important and influential Hollywood pioneers.

©2001 Simon Louvish (P)2019 Tantor

Imagine 18 hours of listening to William Shatner

Apparently this narrator studied at the same school as Shatner. It gets a bit easier toward the end of the book, but still a bit of work to listen to. The narrator' emphasizes at least' three' words of each' sentence, and it is very' hard to listen to (read the accent marks as emphasized words, and you may get a hint). However, if you want a detailed look at our two favorite comedians, this book definitely provides that. One point in the book that I found fascinating is how Stan's salary is always significantly more than Ollie's.

Entertaining and Factual

I would call this more of an educational resource than light reading, but that said, I still found it very enjoyable. It covers the lives of Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy fairly comprehensively from birth to death. It also covers their works, both separately and as a team, in detail. Being a history buff and a biography lover, I did find it entertaining, and learned some things too.
Being a lover of the old Hal Roach Laurel & Hardy movies, I also enjoyed the synopses of their works, because the descriptions called the movies up in my imagination while listening to the book.
I did NOT find the narrator to be annoying, as some other readers described. He speaks very precisely & has a bit of a British accent, but I found this to be appropriate.
This is a book I will listen to again.

Quite good, incredibly detailed and thorough.

The perfect kind of book for old movie obsessives. History lessons galore, not just on the families, life, work and times of Stan and Ollie, but an incredible lesson regarding the birth of the movie industry.

Love Laurel and Hardy!!

This is the most difficult review for me to-date. I've always loved Laurel and Hardy and some of my earliest memories from the 1960's revolve around their movies. This book is difficult to work through due to it's long length - >17 hours. The actual biographical portrait of the boys is great and I thoroughly enjoyed that. The complete filmography of their work is very tedious to work through. Great reference material but very hard to listen to due to the minute details of each work. Another element of the book is a critique of movies. I also struggled mightily in this part of the book. The author ravaged my two very favorite L&H movies (Flying Dueces and The Big Noise) and I probably took his criticism too personally. Summing up, this book is a magnificent reference work for L&H fans or researchers but not so good as a general read for L&H fans.

What a struggle with narrator!

I think the content of the book is very good, but I work so hard trying to understand the narrator that I can't follow the story. He seems to be like Alfred Hitchcock channeling William Shatner. This might be the only audiobook that has a narrator I dislike more than Lavar Burton's desecration of Carl Sagan's Cosmos audiobook.