If Sons of the Desert (1933) is Laurel and Hardy’s most popular feature than Way Out West is a close second. Its popularity is well founded as this is one of the funniest films the boys ever appeared in. This classic was directed by James W. Horne. This was Horne’s last picture for Hal Roach studios. After this he would move to Republic Pictures. His first picture for Republic was the Oslen and Johnson comedy, All Over Town (1937). For that movie he brought some regulars at the Hal Roach studio. That film would feature regular Roach actors James Finlayson Stanley Fields, Fred Kelsey and Jack Egan. Roach writer James Parrott was said to have worked on that film as well, though that is unconfirmed.
The simple plot of Way Out West is little more than excuse to fit in some great comedy and musical numbers. Mickey Finn (James Finlayson) and Lola (Sharon Lynn) are the caretakers of Mary Roberts (Rosia Lawrence). Unfortunately, they are crooked people who couldn’t care less about poor Mary. Stan and Ollie meanwhile are traveling to the town of Brushwood Gulch (where Mickey, Lola and Mary live). They are hitchhiking (this includes a clever reference to Frank Capra’s It Happened One Night with Stan showing a little leg). They eventually get a ride on a stagecoach, where they annoy a woman (Vivian Oakland) also riding. When they get to the town, the woman’s husband (Stanley Fields) turns out to be the sheriff and gives the boys until the next coach comes to get out of town. Luckily, they have a quick and simple job to deliver a deed to a goldmine to Mary Roberts. However, they are fooled into thinking that Lola is Mary (“This is the first mistake we made since we bought the Brooklyn Bridge” says Ollie). When they find out they have to get the deed back which proves to be an extremely difficult task, especially since they were supposed to be out of town by now.
In 1936, it was announced that the next film for another Hal Roach comedy team Pasty Kelly and Reba Roberta was to be called Girls Go West. This film never happened but it was not too long afterward that Stan and Babe would start work on Way Out West. Stan’s wife at the time (Virginia Ruth Rodgers) would later claim that she played a huge part in this movie being made. She would say that her instance that the duo appeared in a western resulted in this film. Whether this is true or not is lost to history.
Shooting for the movie started on Monday August 31, 1936 and finished Wednesday November 11 of the same year. This was a long time for shooting for a Hal Roach film. Most Hal Roach features only took about 40 days to shoot.
The film starts off in a way that might at first scare some Laurel and Hardy fans. At the beginning of the movie Laurel and Hardy do not appear on screen for a few minutes. However once Stan and Ollie show up our fears are quickly clamed. The focus after this is always on the boys. The movie is pure Laurel and Hardy slapstick at its best and this fairly short feature film (just 64 minutes) has more laugh out loud moments than most two-hour slapstick comedies. Still with this in mind the film still manages to have a leisurely relaxing pace. This pace never takes away from the comedy but rather enhances it. It never moves too slowly that it might kill a joke, but it moves slow enough for the film to have an atmospheric feel that makes this one of the most charming and endearing Laurel and Hardy films.
One scene in that is definitely a highlight in this movie is when Stan and Ollie sing Trail of the Lonesome Pine. The scene starts with the boys singing it straight, giving us a great chance to hear Ollie’s fantastic voice. Then Stan’s voice goes into a deep bass (that is obviously not Stan’s voice). Ollie is confused then annoyed. He asks the bartender for a mallet. With this mallet Ollie clunks Stan on the head. Stan’s voice than turns into a woman’s voice. The woman’s voice was supplied by one of the co-stars in this movie, Rosina Lawrence. Chill Wills provides the deep bass voice. In 1975, the audio recording of this song (straight from the movie’s soundtrack) would be released as a single. Shockingly the recording shot up British pop charts and it would land at #2, beating out such huge names as Paul McCartney and Elton John.
Another delightful scene featured Stan eating Ollie’s hat. Earlier in the film Stan has stated that they would get the deed back or he would eat Ollie’s hat. Ollie makes him follow through on this, to teach Stan not to make rash statements. Stan at first eats it reluctantly, then he begins to enjoy it and eats it happily until Ollie pulls it back. The hat was actually made of licorice for the scene. One brilliant touch in this movie is that after this scene happens, Ollie’s hat actually has the bite marks in it and that lasts for the rest of the movie.
Way Out West was not the original title of the film. Some earlier titles were Tonight’s the Night, You’d Be Surprised, In the Money and They Done it Wrong. This movie however was not the first to be called Way Out West. With this title there had already been a two-reel comedy with Hank Man, a 1930 William Haines feature and an Educational short staring the Cabin Kids. The title is perhaps a play on the
In the scene where Stan is relating the story of what had happened so far, a piece of music created by Marvin Hatley called Gossip played. This piece of music originally ran much longer than it does here but needed to be cut in order to fit the movie better. Another piece of music was called Get the Deed and was surprisingly in the scene where everybody is trying to get the deed. This music for Get the Deed moved so fast, that many takes had to be done to finally get it right. The music in this film as a whole is excellent, and it received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Score. This was a very rare thing for a slapstick comedy. After all there were two types of films that the Academy Awards frowned on. These were slapstick comedies and B westerns. So, for a slapstick comedy parodying B westerns to be nominated was quite a feat.
This film originally ran 4 minutes longer, but Hal Roach felt it should be cut to make the film play better. It is believed most of what had been cut had come from the scene with Stan and Ollie hitchhiking. Supposedly originally the sign saying how far away the town was is blowing around. Similarly, there were some scenes in the original script featuring American Indians (natural for a parody of 1930’s B westerns), but they were never filmed. In the original script there was also an ongoing joke, before Stan and Ollie figure out, they have been tricked, where Mickey Finn would get extremely excited every time either Stan or Ollie would mention the goldmine, then have to calm himself down so our heroes don’t get wise.
Some of the musical numbers were performed by the Avalon Brothers, who also appeared alongside W.C. Fields in the classic It’s a Gift (1934). One of the members of the Avalon Brothers was Chill Wills. Supposedly Hal Roach had to remind Chill Wills to calm down his language. Rosina Lawrence’s role in this film was originally intended for Julie Bishop. According to many people who have met her she was just like Mary Roberts in real life. She had the same type of sweet innocence her character here does. Her best remembered role today is as the schoolteacher in many Our Gang shorts. Similarly, Stanley Fields’ role was originally going to go to Tiny Sanford (best known for being the tall man coming up through the elevator in Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights (1931)). This is may have caused a controversy between Stan and Hal Roach as Stan was good friends with Sanford and wanted him in the picture. Some believe this to have caused a strong rift between the two and maybe even caused Stan to think about leaving. Another co-star in this movie was Dinah the mule, who is best known for her many appearances in Our Gang shorts.
World Film News, 1938
World Film News, 1937
Resources Used
DVD commentary by Richard W. Bann and Randy Skretvedt
Laurel and Hardy the Magic Behind the Movies by Randy Skretvedt
https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/614595/way-out-west#articles-reviews?articleId=92511
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