Review - Zenobia

 August 12, 2022
 
Zenobia – U.S., 1939
 

There ought to be a law that a legendary comedy team cannot be broken up unless the pairing that inevitably follows puts the previous one to shame, and such was definitely not the case with Oliver Hardy’s 1939 film with Harry Langdon, Gordon Douglas’s Zenobia. A little backstory here: Back in the late 1930’s, Stan Laurel, apparently yearning for the kind of deal that contemporaries like Chaplin had – creative control, ownership of his films, a pretty impressive paycheck, attempted to take Laurel and Hardy to a rival studio. There was only one problem: his partner in comedy, who was still under contract, got cold feet. Hal Roach then began to craft an Oliver Hardy brand centering on Hardy’s merry adventures as an unfortunate father and husband. Zenobia was part of this effort, and its failure at the box office is likely what brought Hardy’s solo career to a screeching halt and necessitated a mad scramble to bring Stan back into the fold. According to 2018’s Stan & Ollie, Zenobia, referred to as the “elephant movie” throughout the picture, remained a source of tension for years.
 
In Laurel’s place, Roach inserted Harry Langdon, who got his start playing the kind of man-child that it’s hard to fathom any single woman giving the time of day. To be fair, there were aspects of this type of character in Stan Laurel’s go-to persona, but Laurel’s character was all heart and sweetness. There was an authentic bond between him and the people in his life that Langdon’s immature characters for the most part lacked. Fortunately, Langdon is not playing a version of this earlier role; alas, he is unfortunately tasked with playing a truly undefined character, one that morphs into whatever the script requires at any given moment, including both protagonist and antagonist.
 
Zenobia takes place in Mississippi in 1870, and the state is in remarkably excellent shape despite the fact that it was the scene of over 26 major battles and lost at least 15,000 of its residents during the Civil War. Indeed, this is a Mississippi where most of the white residents, both rich and poor, dress like aristocrats and reside in the some of the most lavish homes you’ll ever see. And yet underneath the gentlemanly pleasantries and exquisite attire lies a deep undercurrent of classism; here, the upper class are expected to mingle with and cater to the whims of their fellow upperclassmen almost exclusively.
 
It is under these circumstances that we meet doctor Emory Tibbett (Oliver Hardy), who we learn early on has incurred the wrath of the upper class for having the audacity to believe that it is more important to help those who really do need medical help than to respond every time a wealthy person sneezes. And for his part, he seems fine with the exclusion. The problem is that in the film’s opening scene, his daughter, Mary (Jean Parker), becomes engaged to Jeffrey Carter (James Ellison), the son of one of those wealthy patrons, and there’s a strong suggestion that Jeffrey’s mother (Alice Brady) would not be too keen to be connected by marriage to a mere “country doctor.”
 
What’s needed, therefore, is to make a good impression and not to have any incidents that would give anyone a further reason to cast aspersions upon the family. You know, something like being discovered to be treating a 6,000-pound elephant named Zenobia, who just happens to be owned by a traveling salesman, tonic con man, and jealous elephant owner named Throndyke McCrackle (Langdon). Pretty soon the elephant is wreaking havoc at a ball and Hardy finds himself being sued for stealing the affection of an elephant. Really.
 
Zenobia is a good example of a studio not recognizing the good things standing in front of them. They had, first of all, a charismatic leading man who was more than capable of playing both comedy and drama. They had a story with tons of potential to produce laughs and cause audience members to reflect on the current state of affairs. And they had a dynamic comedy team who could have soared if just given a decent chance. I’m speaking here of Oliver Hardy and Billy Burke, who plays Hardy’s sweet and cheerfully dense wife, Bessie. The two are the kind of pairing that Burns and Allen would later make a staple of television. Here’s a sample of their dialogue:
 
            Hardy: “I’m the happiest man in the state of Mississippi.”
            Burke: “So am I.”
 
            Hardy: “I’m not an elephant!”
            Burke: ‘Well, not exactly.”
 
While their delivery of such banter is perfect, what stands out is their chemistry. The way they look at each other makes you believe that time has had no impact of the depths of their love for each other, regardless of any frustrations that Bessie’s quirks may cause. It made me wish they’d made more films together or, at the very least, that this one had turned out better.
 
One of the problems with Zenobia is, curiously, Zenobia herself, for once she is introduced, her storyline dominates the film, yet there isn’t much drama or comedy to be found in her storyline. We might marvel of some of her choreography, but soon she’s stealing precious screen time from the film’s original conflict. As a result, both Mary and Jeffrey remain one-dimensional characters; the same is true of a family friend named Virginia (June Lang). It’s clear that she has her eyes set on Jeffrey (with his mother’s approval), but it is never clear who she is and why she thinks Jeffrey would agree to marry her once she breaks up his engagement. Instead, we get a courtroom scene and a series of those false moments in which a character says something wise and a supporting character has a sudden change of heart. It’s storytelling at its laziest.
 
The film’s other hiccup involves the Tibbett family’s domestic help. While Hattie McDaniels does the best she can with the only kind of role that Hollywood seems to have ever cast her in, her character’s husband is played by Stepin Fetchit, and to say that his stereotypical role has not aged well would be putting it mildly. Lazy, easily confused, scared by the smallest thing, and hard to understand on account of his tendency to mumble, the role is essentially a caricature, a collection of stereotypes begun and perfected in minstrel shows. We know better now, and lines like “I know what’s wrong, but I can’t remember” land with a jaw-dropping thud now. To make matters worse, his character’s name is Zero. Such were the times.
 
Zenobia is never unwatchable – Hardy never is, after all - yet it is hard not to ponder what could have been had Roach and company trusted Hardy and Burke to carry the film, had they expanded the elements involving class warfare, and had they given more screen time to the supporting characters. The pairing of Hardy and Langdon doesn’t work because there was little thought given to their pairing. They have decent rapport, but they are failed by a script that is trying too hard to replicate the zaniness of a Laurel and Hardy picture. At one point, Hardy strains himself to utter what Roach obviously intended as Hardy’s new catchphrase, This is a fine state of affairs, and you can almost hear the collective silence of the audience in 1939.  
 
Burke’s career would survive Zenobia. That same year, she played Glinda in The Wizard of Oz, and she continued acting until 1960. Langdon, on the other hand, made mostly short films for the remainder of his career before dying of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1944. Hardy would reunite with Laurel, and the two continued to make films together until 1950. The prevailing wisdom is that they should never have been broken up in the first place, and yet what I wouldn’t give for another Hardy-Burke picture. (on DVD)
 
2 and a half stars