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May
16th
2005
Open
For Big Business
Fra
Diavolo tent official launch night on Wed 15th June 2005
The official opening of the Fra Diavolo
tent, the North
Lanarkshire chapter of the Son's of the Desert, is to take place on Wednesday the 15th June (the
eve of Stan Laurel's 115th birthday). As
well as having members of the press present to cover proceedings we are
also delighted to announce that actors Steve McNicoll and
Barnaby Power, stars of the
recent Edinburgh revival of Tom McGrath's "Laurel and Hardy"
play, will be at hand to open proceedings.
ACTOR
STEVE McNICOLL
On the night, anybody is welcome to join the proceedings at Cumbernauld
Village Hall from 7.30 onwards, just don't blame us if you get your
bottom paddled when you walk through the door!
click
here for map to Cumbernauld Village Hall
May 7th
2005
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Laurel and Hardy, Royal Lyceum,
Edinburgh
VICE
SHEIK Dean writes:
"A
fantastic show. The mannerisms of Stan and Ollie were spot on by Steven
and Barnaby, too often plays are works of fiction that allow actors
scope to stamp their own mark on the characters, Steven and Barnaby
however had to be accurate with their portrayals of The Boys and to be
honest that is what I was apprehensive about before going to see the
play. I had read enough about the script to know I would be satisfied
with the story, but the actual acting had me a little worried. The play
had hardly started and my worries were proven foundless, Steve and
Barnaby gave a performance that seemed effortless which made me
instantly realise that these lads clearly were fans of The Boys. They
seemed to capture that magical era of cinematic brilliance with relative
ease, their professionalism and passion shone through in their actions.
 
I particularly like the wallpaper sketch The Lads performed, no speech
just pure slapstick action. Afterwards Barnaby said the script only said
'decorating sketch' and they were left to devise it themselves. He
expressed how pleased he was when a popular British broadsheet newspaper
wrote that the sketch was exactly how Laurel and Hardy performed it.
Surely a compliment of the highest calibre considering Laurel and Hardy
NEVER performed the sketch!
The Fra
Diavolo tent meet the stars of the play
I also liked the way the play was done in black and white to stay true
to the way we all knew and loved The Boys work. It was a magical night
made very special by the actors who were very accomodating, posed for
pictures backstage and asked us to wait in the bar for a chat
afterwards. Upon leaving the theatre they broke back into character and
shouted 'Goodbye' repeatedly whilst waving as The Boys did.
I remember reading somewhere that no-one could ever come within a
thousand mile of The Boys, and since many have tried and failed I always
believed this claim, but no more Steven McNicoll and Barnaby Power
pulled off what I thought couldn't be done. I take my 'derby' hat off to them
because now, when I think of 'The Boys', I also think of 'The Lads' who
deserve the highest praise for their portray of my heroes.
Dean
GRAND
SHEIK Ross writes:
"Portraying
an icon is very difficult, so many have tried and failed in the past.
The fans don't let anyone mess around and with personas as familiar as
Stan and Ollie's. It's too easy to find innaccuracies and flaws.
However, Steve
McNicoll and Barnaby
Powers'
portrayal of Laurel and Hardy in the Tom McGrath play isn't a mere
impersonation of the boys, it was
Laurel and Hardy on stage from start to finish. Watching Steve as Oliver
Hardy sends a shiver down your spine, as he really does capture Babe's
mannerisms perfectly in every way. There were several eerie moments when
one could be forgiven for forgetting this was not the real Oliver Hardy
on stage, but instead, a fine Scots actor. The posture, the accent, the
character, the timing... Steven captures it all. Not that Barnaby
Powers' portrayal of Stan was any less impressive. Barnaby told us
afterwards that both he and Steve have been massive fans of the boys for
many years and that's exactly why they jumped at the chance of the role.
I asked him which of Stans habits did he 'pick up on' whilst studying
the films for the role. He explained, "If you watch the films
closely, you will notice Stan had a habit of touching his bow tie, or
his chin, sometimes his chest. He did this 'hand acting' a lot. A fine
example is in County
Hospital when Stan is eating the boiled egg. Watch his hands as
he eats that egg, he is always busy doing things with them. I decided to
use this method of 'acting' with the hands in my portrayal of Stan,
simply because Stan Laurel did it and he did it often."
As Dean explained above, leaving the theatre were us 4 going in
one direction and the actors heading off in another so we all ended the
night with a repeat of the 'goodbye' scene from Perfect Day. Off they
went , with a big juicy steak a la
oliver hanging out of Steve's pocket as they tranced off. Someone
had given it to them as a gift after the show... and I ain't kidding! As
for the wallpaper sketch, I had often pictured Laurel and Hardy doing that sketch
(loosely based on Norman Wisdoms famous skit) and now
I know for sure it would have worked had they ever performed it for
real. Thanks to Steve and Barnaby for a great night and thanks to Dean,
Will and especially our editor Drew for taking the time to travel out to Edinburgh.
I can definately confirm a big seal of approval from the Fra Diavolo
tent is in order. We wish the lads all the best
with the run of the show and long may it continue with Steve and Barnaby
playing our heroes."
Ross
FRA
GRAND SHEIK ROSS WITH STEVE AND BARNABY
FRA
VICE SHEIK DEAN WITH STEVE AND BARNABY
FRA
NEWSLETTER EDITOR DREW WITH STEVE AND BARNABY
BOGUS
BANDIT WILLIE SMITH WITH STEVE AND BARNABY
April 23rd
2005
Article from The
Scotsman Newspaper
Going out
Laurel and Hardy Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, today until 14 May
IN 1927 THE REPUTATION OF A NEW comic partnership was sealed with a film, Putting Pants on Philip. In it, pompous J Piedmont Mumblethunder, played by Oliver Hardy, meets his nephew from Scotland, Stan Laurel. Stan arrives in a kilt, and is immediately taken to a tailor for a pair of proper trousers.
Oliver Norvell Hardy and Arthur Stanley Jefferson, to give them their proper names, had performed together ten years earlier in the film A Lucky Dog. When they teamed up again, Stan Laurel, working as a director and gag writer, directed Oliver Hardy in a couple of films.
Just who spotted their comedy potential is unclear, but Laurel came to regard Putting Pants on Philip as the first true Laurel and Hardy film. His return to performing, as Hardys partner, initiated a stream of films that lasted for the best part of 20 years.
More than 50 years later, in the early 1970s, the actors Kenny Ireland and John Shedden visited the home of playwright Tom McGrath. They wanted him to put a show together about Laurel and Hardy, of whom they were both fans. Their reason was simple, McGrath recalls: "It would be popular because Stan and Ollie were so popular." McGraths play was first staged at the Traverse, with Ireland playing Ollie.
Laurel and Hardy returns to the Scottish stage this month at Irelands old workplace, the Royal Lyceum Theatre. A two-man show in which the pair review their lives from purgatory, it is directed by Tony Cownie, and stars Steven McNicoll as Hardy, and Barnaby Power as Laurel.
McGrath was once asked by an actor in an English revival of Laurel and Hardy if it wouldnt be better to call it something else. He feared "a new generation didnt know who they were".
Blasphemy? Probably not. McGraths play debuted in 1973, for an audience still raised on black-and-white silent comedies in films and TV. After Hollywood lost interest in Laurel and Hardy during the Second World War, they were revived by the small screen in the 1950s, and the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Laurel and Hardy remained a TV staple for years. But can they still compete for attention for youngsters raised on the text message and PlayStation?
Laurel and Hardy are cultural icons, McGrath responds. "I think they definitely have lasting appeal. They are so instantly recognisable. They are a brand name, people use them in advertising, in cartoons; people still know who they are even if they havent seen them." Many of us still have them somewhere at the back of our minds. That quackety-quack theme tune; Laurels slow breakdown into weeping and Hardys coy tie-wiggling; slapstick, mayhem; and, inevitably, Hardys catchphrase, "Thats another fine mess youve gotten me into."
Proving, perhaps, their perennial appeal, the Sons of the Desert - the international Laurel and Hardy appreciation society - opened a Scottish chapter last month. The society (whose Latin motto means "Two Minds without a Single Thought") takes its name from the 1933 film of the same name. One of their first and finest full-length films, it sees the two actors sneak away from their hectoring wives to a fraternity lodge convention, pretending to be on an ocean cruise on a liner that subsequently sinks. The Scottish chapter, or "tent", is named Fra Diavolo, after the 1933 Laurel and Hardy film styled as a burlesque operetta. The Grand Sheik of the tent, cabaret actor Ross Owen, plans to see the play with three fellow members. "They appeal to all ages, Laurel and Hardy," he says. "My little boy, who is six, is a big fan. Children find themselves more intelligent than Laurel and Hardy. If Ollie walks into a door, kids will laugh at something so silly. For adults, its much the same. Its the silliness. People who are not fans seem to think its all slapstick but theres a lot more to it. A lot of the one-liners have inspired people today."
The plays director, Tony Cownie, talks of the pairs child-like quality of innocence. "They more or less behave like children, doing what children do," he says. "They break things, and get things the wrong way round, and get found out. I remember as a child watching them and being really scared; they were going to get into so much trouble."
THERE IS A SCOTTISH CONNECTION. The Stan Laurel who turned up in a kilt in Putting Pants on Philip was born in Ulverston, in Cumbria, in 1890, but made his stage debut in a packed Glasgow music hall, the city where his father ran the Metropole Theatre for 20 years.
Hardy played the indignant small-town American, having been raised in the US South, where he made his start as a child singer, movie projectionist, and actor, but he came of Scottish and English parents.
The play features plenty of the best repartee, but less of the violent slapstick, which often depended heavily on film techniques, or would be too dangerous to switch from screen to stage. Stans trick of setting his thumb on fire instead of a match is a case in point.
The two men were very different. Laurel, on screen the empty-head who takes instructions literally, with disastrous effect, off-screen also worked as a director, writer, and editor, and fought hard to keep creative control. He was partly defined by jealousy towards rival Charlie Chaplin, whose understudy he once was. "He became quite obsessed about outdoing Chaplin," says McGrath.
"Oliver Hardy went off to the golf course at the end of the shoot," says McGrath. "Stan would stay behind and do the editing." He even timed how long audiences laughed to judge the slow-burning holds on the actors faces that characterise the films.
"Laurel had a great kind of comedy that was all his own," says McGrath. "When I was working on the play, the more I got to know about him as a writer, the more in awe of him I became."
But McGrath does not discount the skills of Oliver Hardy. The boy soprano who ran away from home to join a minstrel show was first cast as a heavyweight villain because of his build. "It took a long time before his comic potential was realised. He was magical in front of a camera. That was the thing about Ollie, the emotions he can convey. He was a wonderful performer."
TIM CORNWELL
ROSS
says: The
writer of the above article has inferred that the Fra Diavolo
tent is the only S.O.T.D. tent in Scotland. Obviously this isn't
the case and I can only apologize for not making this clear to
the reporter. I naturally assumed he was already aware of the
other Scottish tents in operation when he approached me to
comment in the article.
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April 11th 2005
Words
Of Wisdom
Comedy great Norman Wisdom gives
the Fra Diavolo tent his seal of of approval!
On Sunday 10th April Grand Sheik Ross Owen had the honour of meeting Sir Norman Wisdom
O.B.E on The Isle of Man. Ross relates his story to us at the Laurel and Hardy
Forum...
ROSS WRITES...
"Sunday
10th April 2005 saw the World Karate Championships head for the Isle Of
Man, home of showbusiness legend Sir Norman Wisdom and Norman was booked
to open the event.
Imagine my delight when I found out that my friend Jim was entering the
tournament. I immediately arranged to go with him because just a glimpse
of Sir Norman, who has famously met the boys more than once, would have
been a thrill. The event was also a fundraiser, which explains Normans
presence there.
A few days before I was due to set off, I spoke to the event organiser,
who told me he would personally introduce me to Norman on the day, so I
got to thinking... maybe I could use this opportunity to find out a few
things about Stan and Ollie and Normans time with them? I had to at
least try.
As Sunday approached I found myself getting more excited and nervous
about what I was going to say to this remarkable man who just celebrated
his 90th birthday in February this year. I packed my recording equipment
and printed out the many questions for Norman I had received fom the
Laurel and Hardy forum members and started memorising them till I knew
them backwards, re-wording them, setting up links to each question etc.
I was all set for my meeting.
Jim and I arrived on the Isle of Man the evening before the event. I
couldn't sleep that night. Jim claims I was shouting "Mr Grimsdale"
in my sleep, but I strongly suspect he is winding me up!
It's now 7.30am Sunday morning and in about 2 hours I am due to meet Sir
Norman. I run through my questions again mentally and check my recording
equipment is working.. all is well and we set off to the Sports centre
where the event is being held.
Norman is due to arrive at 9.30am. It's now 9am and I start to get real
nervous. What if I mess up? What if I ask the wrong question at the
wrong time? What if Norman doesn't like my approach? All this goes
through my mind and then it hits me... maybe he would be offended at me
turning up at a charity event with recording equipment expecting an
interview. It was then I decided I was going to ditch the recording
equipment and just play the whole thing by ear in case I blew it
altogether.
... and then it happened... at exactly
9.30am on the dot, this little silver haired man with an unmistakeable
strut appears at the top of the stairs and to a massive round of
applause starts jogging around the hall. Have you ever seen a 90 year
old do this? It is an unbelievable, yet slightly worrying sight to
witness. The event organiser, who knows I make a living from being a
cabaret entertainer, took me totally by surprise by then handing me the
radio mic and inviting me to compere the event for the duration of
Normans appearance. The result was Norman interupting every announcement
with silly questions and comedic efforts to get the mic so he could sing
etc. It was a truly magical moment which I shall never forget.
Norman then mingled with the crowd for a few minutes signing autographs
etc until it was time for the championships to start. This is when his
housekeeper, the lady who looks after him everywhere he goes, invited me
to spend some time alone with Norman before he took off. He had another
presentation to attend later that day so I quickly grabbed the 2 sons of
the desert fez's I had taken along, together with 2 copies of a rare
Laurel and Hardy photo with Norman which I bought from the sun newspaper
(it appeared in a 1952 article) which I hoped he would sign for me.
Since I was planning to present Norman with an honorary membership our
Fra Diavolo tent, I made up a certificate for him and to top it all off
I took along a copy of the Stan Laurel interview cd from 1957 to present
to him. The 3 of us (myself, Norman and his housekeeper) then headed
upstairs. Normans housekeeper then offered to take pics while Norman
signed my items and chatted to me.
I just couldn't believe that I was sat at this little table on my own
with Sir Norman Wisdom in a quiet corner of the sports centre with NO
distractions. I knew I only had about 10 or 15 mins to present Norman
with his membership, get my items signed and ask any questions I had,
but if you ever meet this remarkable man you will realise that although
still in amazing physical health, sadly his memory is fading a bit, so
to ask him about stuff from way back in the 40's and 50's would have
been ambitious and perhaps rude of me, so I just asked him every day
questions like. how are you?, are you enjoying your retiremement? etc.
He then told me he plans to make another movie. A JB Priestley story
about an old man. He got quite excited as he talked about it but since
the details were rather exclusive, I feel it is not my place to give too
much away in such a public way before the news is released officially.
I then told Norman about the forum, the interest in him from the members
and I told him about our tent. He mentioned that he had received a
beautiful, giant birthday card from the sons
of the desert (he said he thinks it was from Preston) and he
loves it. To my absolute delight he then gladly accepted my offer of
membership to the Fra Diavolo tent. I presented Sir Norman with a Fra
Diavolo members certificate, a Sons Of The Desert Fez and a copy of the
Art Friedman interview with Stan Laurel from 1957 on CD which I thought
he would like to hear. He was very interested in the Stan
interview.
When I showed him the pic of him with the boys he was engrossed, staring
at it for almost a minute without saying a word. I asked him a few
questions as he looked at it, but after a short silence, all he could
say was.. "where can I get one of these?" So I said he could
have the spare one I had. I'd like to have had it signed but seeing the
delight on Normans face when I told him he could keep it was worth the
sacrifice. He signed the other one and dedicated it to my son 'Hunter'.
He then mentioned a 'second' pic taken of him and the boys on the same
night, the more commonly known one with Norman in his dressing gown
(below).
He accepted the sons of the desert fez I presented him with and even put
it on, but I didn't manage to capture it with the camera as Normans
housekeeper had it and was slightly distracted at the time with the
organisers of Normans next engagement that day. He then signed another
fez which we intend to display at our meetings.
It was at this point Norman apologised and explained that he had to go
to his next presentation. he then said, "why don't you come up to
the house tommorrow (Monday) for a chat?". I could have died. My
boat was leaving at 7.45 that evening (Sunday) and I had a meeting
arranged with Billy Connolly on the Monday evening so I couldn't even
stay on. I was very disappointed, but I know if I am ever back on the
Isle Of Man I can go and visit my new friend, Sir Norman Wisdom OBE.
A true legend and a gentleman. God bless him!
A big heartfelt thank you also goes to Normans personal assistant and
housekeeper who allowed me to meet Norman privately in order to chat to
him and present him with his membership etc. I am eternally
grateful."
Ross Owen
SUMMARY
Imagine Ross' delight upon arriving at the event to be offered the chance to compare for Norman and take part
in the act he put on for the benefit of attendees. As if this were not enough our leader was offered the chance of a private audience with the veteran King of Comedy. Norman is in very good health, especially when considering his staggering 90 years, and has new projects planned for the future. During Ross' short interview with him he spoke fondly of the Sons of the Desert and graciously accepted, when offered, honorary membership of the Fra Diavolo tent. He also cast doubt upon the idea that Stan Laurel once offered to become part of his act, if it did happen, Norman didn't know about it!
Isn't that something?
Drew
More photographs of Ross's meeting with Norman can be found HERE.
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