Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's Personal Chefs
Movie | |
---|---|
German title | His Majesty's Personal Chefs TV Title: Nothing but Trouble |
Original title | Nothing but trouble |
Country of production | United States |
original language | English |
Publishing year | 1944 |
length | 79 minutes |
Rod | |
Director | Sam Taylor |
script |
Russell Rouse Ray Golden |
production | BF Zeidman |
music | Nathaniel Shilkret |
camera | Charles Salerno Jr. |
cut | Conrad A. Annoying |
occupation | |
|
His Majesty's personal chefs (Original title: Nothing but Trouble , TV title: Nothing but Trouble ) is a comedy by Sam Taylor and one of the last films with Laurel and Hardy .
action
The Butler Stan and Chef Oliver return after a few years abroad in the United States back to where currently full employment prevails. Where once - during the Great Depression - there was still great unemployment, employers are now desperately looking for employees in the agencies. Stan and Ollie get a job with the rich high society lady Mrs. Hawkley and her husband Basil Hawkley.
By chance, at a football game, they meet a boy who calls himself Chris and tells them that he no longer has parents. The two of them become friends with him and - without the knowledge of Mrs. Hawkley - give him shelter in the house. What the two don't know: Chris is actually the exile king of Orlandia. His guardian and uncle, Prince Saul, wants to have him eliminated because Christopher's ideas for a reign seem too modern and democratic to him and because he hopes to become the new king himself. At the evening dinner, the Hawkleys welcome Prince Saul of all people as a guest. Stan and Ollie, in their capacity as domestic servants, wreak havoc at dinner with their clumsiness, and when the boy is discovered by Mrs. Hawkley, she dismisses Stan and Oliver.
The two go to a men's pension with Chris. Meanwhile, a reward of 1,000 US dollars has been offered by the uncle to find the boy again. Then Stan and Oliver are slandered. They are suspected of kidnapping the boy and arrested. The boy - meanwhile back with his uncle Saul - gets her out of prison and asks his uncle to take them on. Saul hires the two of them, but only so that you can stir up some poison in the food for King Christopher, so that he dies and you can then blame the two clumsy bums for it. The plan fails because Stan and Ollie argue over which piece Christopher should get. Thereupon Saul tries to force the two and Christopher with a pistol to jump out of the window. On the floor below, two beams hang from the window due to renovation work, through which Christopher can save himself. The bars are pulled away when Stan and Oliver try to jump down. The danger is averted when Prince Saul accidentally eats the food with the poison, which was actually intended for Christopher. At the end you see Stan, Oliver, Christopher and the policemen in the kitchen singing a song.
backgrounds
- The film was the third to last Laurel and Hardy comedy. Both actors were over 50 years old and had passed the zenith of their success after the collaboration with Hal Roach had ended. MGM's way of producing this film was very different from what it was in Roach before. The two comedians now had to work strictly according to the script. Improvisations in front of the camera - the order of the day at Roach - were virtually nonexistent. In addition, Laurel had received no contractual assurance about the creative collaboration behind the camera. As a result, the duo's influence on their films slipped so much that they turned down Fox's offer for a five-year contract in the summer of 1945. However, in 1945 Fox was still shooting Laurel and Hardy's penultimate film, The Bullfighters , the last to be made in the USA. In 1950/51, Atoll K was her last film as a British-French-Italian co-production.
- The silent film legend Buster Keaton , a close friend of Stan Laurel, served as a gag writer.
- Christopher's cast member David Leland died of sepsis just four years after the film at the age of 16 .
German versions
- In 1952, the first dubbed version in the dubbing department of MGM was created under the title Die Personalköche his Majestät . Walter Bluhm spoke to Stan Laurel and Arno Paulsen Ollie.
- A second version was created for the series Lachen Sie mit Stan and Ollie at Beta-Technik in Munich. Walter Bluhm took over again Stan Laurel and Michael Habeck spoke Oliver Hardy. Theo Lingen gave a brief introduction at the beginning. Wolfgang Schick was responsible for the script and dialogue direction .
- A third version was created in 1988 in the DEFA studio for synchronization in the GDR. Gert Kießling spoke to Stan Laurel; he already had it up in his hands - or hadn't spoken. Roland Hemmo took over Oliver Hardy. The dialogue book was written by Gudrun Ickler and directed by Wolfgang Thal.
Reviews
As with many of her later films, the critical reaction was significantly more negative than with her Hal Roach films.
“The two's last comedy film for a large MGM studio only shows its qualities to a limited extent, rather diluting them with numerous sentimentalities. Still amusing entertainment. "
Web links
- Laurel and Hardy: The body cooks his majesty in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 1st version
- Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 2nd version
- Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 3rd version
Individual evidence
- ↑ Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 1st version
- ↑ a b c Norbert Aping: Das kleine Dick-und-Doof-Buch Schüren, Marburg 2014, appendix p. 432f.
- ↑ Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 2nd version
- ↑ Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's personal chefs in the German dubbing index , 3rd version
- ↑ Laurel and Hardy: His Majesty's Personal Chefs. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed October 10, 2017 .