Sugar Daddies (1927) - film review

Millionaire Cyrus Brittle wakes up one day to find that, in the course of a night of drunken revelry, he managed to get married to a complete stranger.  The bride’s brother is a good-for-nothing extortioner whose hobbies include murdering people.  Determined not to give in to his in-laws demands for a pay off, Brittle takes flight, accompanied by his butler and his lawyer.  Unfortunately, the wife and her gun-toting brother are not far behind...

This silent short marks the end of an era for Laurel and Hardy, the last film in which they appeared together not as friends but as unconnected characters.  They are partnered with James Finlayson, who would subsequently appear in many of the films they made at Hal Roach Studios.   Although Stan and Ollie have little to do together here, it is still apparent that they have a natural comic rapport and look destined to form an enduring double act.  The film’s one running gag (Stan posing as Ollie’s tall wife by sitting on Finlayson's shoulders and wearing a long coat) is an extension of one that the boys first used in Love 'Em and Weep (1927).  There isn’t much to this film other than an amusing chase through a fun fair which ends with a corker of a punch line.  Film buffs should note that the film’s cinematographer was none other than George Stevens, who would later have an enormous impact as a film director, with such films as A Place in the Sun (1951) and Shane (1953).

© Brian Evans 2010

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