During the first dozen or so years that Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy made their wonderful movies for Hal Roach's studio, they were under separate contracts that expired at different times. This gave Roach a bit of bargaining leverage. When Stan's contract ended, it was not possible for Laurel and Hardy to threaten to go elsewhere since Ollie was still tied to that studio. So Laurel would re-up at a slight increase on the old terms and then a few months later when Hardy's contract ran out, he'd also have no choice but to sign again. Eventually, Stan decided that this had to stop; that even if they wound up staying with Roach, the two of them should negotiate as a unit and sign as a unit.
In 1938, Laurel and Hardy made Block-Heads for Roach. The filming did not go smoothly as Mr. Laurel was then beset with some personal (and unfortunately, publicized) problems in his home life. Since his latest contract was expiring, rumors spread that this would be the last Laurel and Hardy film. In reality though, Laurel was not only ready to work with Hardy again, he'd decided not to sign a new deal but instead to wait until Hardy was a free agent. This meant that for around six months, Roach had Hardy under contract but not Laurel. During that time, Oliver made a film without Stan — a quirky screwball comedy most often called Zenobia. It was also released in various countries as Elephants Never Forget, It's Springtime Again and Zenobia's Revenge. Never trust a movie with more titles than jokes.
In it, Mr. Hardy plays a country doctor who nurses a sick elephant back to health and is then unable to get rid of the beast. Cast as the elephant's handler was Harry Langdon, who had once been considered a peer of Chaplin, Lloyd and Keaton in silent comedy. By '39, that status was as defunct as silent pictures themselves, and Langdon was appearing in low budget comedies and also working as a gag writer for Laurel and Hardy. In fact, he was one of the writers of Block-Heads, the opening of which bears more than a slight resemblance to his 1926 classic, Soldier Man.
When gossip columnists heard that Hardy was making a film sans Laurel and with Langdon, they jumped to the not-illogical — but also not true — conclusion that Stan was out and that Zenobia would be the first in a series of Langdon and Hardy movies. The Roach studio seems to have decided that this was a good publicity angle, and perhaps a way to put a little pressure on Laurel, so little was done to discourage such speculations.
Zenobia is not a great film by any means. Hardy is quite good in a change-of-pace role that reminds you that he wasn't really that dumb guy who palled around with Mr. Laurel. He was an actor and a pretty good one, at that. Langdon is also fine in the film…but in no way are the two men teamed in the sense that Laurel and Hardy were teamed. They're merely two actors who happen to be in the same movie, and Langdon doesn't even have that much screen time. (Zenobia also features Stepin Fetchit and Billie Burke, among others. Ms. Burke did many things in many movies which no one remembers because she was the Good Witch in The Wizard of Oz.)
By the time Zenobia reached theaters, Stan and Ollie were back making movies together. They did an independent film called The Flying Deuces and then there was a new deal with Roach for a couple more pictures. Langdon was among the writers for these and he continued to appear in other films, including a series of shorts for Columbia and a few halting attempts to team him with actor-gagman Charley Rogers, who'd also written for Stan and Ollie. Langdon passed away in 1944.
Zenobia can be seen early Thursday, January 5, on Turner Classic Movies. It's on at 7:15 AM Eastern time so we're talking 4:15 in the morning on this coast. It will be preceded by The Flying Deuces, the movie which exists on more cheapo tapes and DVDs than any other movie ever made. We assume TCM will not be running one of the nineteenth-generation copies they sell at the 99-Cent Store.