Today's Video Link

As I mentioned on this blog some time back, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy filmed their early talkies several times. The craft of dubbing movies for overseas markets wasn't perfected right after sound movies began so to not lose that revenue stream, they did versions of their films in other languages.

They'd shoot the English versions and then go back soon after and refilm all the scenes that involved dialogue. Sometimes, actors who spoke those other languages would replace the supporting actors in the English versions. Stan and Ollie of course would do their own parts which would mean speaking French or German or Spanish, even though neither spoke those tongues. A coach would teach them how to pronounce the words and they'd read their lines off an off-screen blackboard.

Eventually, the studios learned how to dub films and they could stop doing this but the foreign language versions are fascinating. Sometimes, they include scenes and sequences that were not in the English versions.

This little compilation shows you excerpts from various versions. Remember: That's not dubbing. That's Laurel and Hardy speaking languages they did not understand…