Langdon is little known by most and seems very much like Buster Keaton, but just a bit more shy. Twelve year old Philip Hurlic turns in a memorable performance that needs to be seen in the context of today. With the town in an uproar and his wife (Billie Burke) embarrassed at the spectacle, Dr Tibbetts is the focus of laughter, ridicule and a lawsuit.
Proving that a good deed never goes unpunished for Hardy, the patient, attempting to say 'thanks', relentlessly follows the good doctor and there is no place to hide, not even a formal social gathering. A beloved country doctor (Oliver Hardy) is surprised and resists, but is coerced into treating a fully grown elephant for a terrible condition. Made the same year as "Gone With The Wind", Zenobia takes place in a time before the Civil War, where a small Southern plantation town at peace, is disrupted when the excitable traveling promoter (Harry Langdon), seeks aid for his ailing partner. William Bakewell can be spotted in a bit part.įor those looking for the magic of Laurel and Hardy, "Zenobia" offers an alternative that occurred because of Laurel's contract negotiations. Farrell McDonald is the judge, Olin Howland is the lawyer, Hobart Cavanaugh plays a patient, Philip Hurlic (as the kid) has a great scene, June Lang plays a rival, and Stepin Fetchit plays himself. Burke and Brady are total pros, and Jean Parker is pretty and pleasing.
Hardy is very good in a comic role that allows him a little room to act. Definitely a B film, but not without its good points. Many will be disappointed by Langdon's standing in for Stan Laurel, but it's interesting to see Langdon in a talkie. The cast works well in this mild but pleasant comedy. There is a good court room scene and the usual ending. Langdon gets mad and sues Hardy (with the help of mean-spirited Brady). Zenobia is so grateful, she falls in love with Hardy and refuses to leave his side.
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Zenobia's owner (silent comic great, Harry Langdon) helps Hardy figure out how to treat an elephant. When Hardy is summoned to come help someone who is sick, he races across town only to find that the patient is an elephant (Zenobia) in a traveling carnival. Hardy's wife (Billie Burke)invites everyone to dinner to try to smooth thing over. Brady will not have Parker as a daughter-in-law because the the family's low social standing. Meanwhile his daughter (Jean Parker) is engaged to the rich woman's son (James Ellison). Oliver Hardy stars as a small-town doctor in Mississippi who hits on hard times when he insults the local rich woman (Alice Brady). But Zenobia is a film filled with gentle humor and some good comic situations.
Of course Stan Laurel came to terms and Langdon and Hardy were no more. Look at the rest of his cast which he got from the major studios, if he was to have a new comedy team, they would be launched properly. Getting Alice Brady and Billie Burke was a casting coup of sorts for Hal Roach. Actually Burke and Brady, a couple of veteran Broadway performers, have some scenes together and they're pretty good in and of themselves. They're like Abbott and Costello in The Time Of Their Lives, a comedy team in two separate roles in which they only interact occasionally. Though they were advertised as a team, Langdon and Hardy are not a team really in this film, though their scenes with Zenobia are pretty funny. When the pachyderm becomes ill, Ollie effects a cure and the beast's gratitude makes his life miserable. Nevertheless Ollie and Billie try to help Jean with her romance, but Ollie gets himself entangled with traveling medicine show man Harry Langdon and his performing elephant Zenobia. James Ellison, late of the Hopalong Cassidy series, wants her hand in marriage, but his mother Alice Brady forbids it as Jean's parents are just not her sort. Ollie is a country doctor in post Civil War Mississippi who lives with wife Billie Burke and daughter Jean Parker in genteel poverty. So with Ollie signed with studio again and Stan balking at terms, Hal Roach decided to pair Hardy with Harry Langdon who was trying to recapture the stardom he enjoyed in the silent era. Their contracts were negotiated separately unlike Abbott and Costello or the Ritz Brothers, etc. For those wondering what Oliver Hardy was doing in a film without Stan Laurel, we have to remember that Hal Roach created the team back in silent days when he had these two comedians both signed to contracts with him.
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