OLIVER HARDYThe American screen star Oliver Hardy died on 7 August, 1957, having made a contribution to comedy that defies comprehension in modern terms.During the silent film era he made more than 250 pictures before teaming up with fellow star Stan Laurel for a partnership that would span four decades and produce many of cinema history's finest moments.He was born Norvell Hardy on 18 January, 1982, in Harlem, Georgia. He showed promise as an entertainer from an early age and after running away to join a singing troupe as a child, instead of being scolded, his mother started paying for singing lessons.After falling in love with the cinema as a teenager he moved to Jacksonville in Florida where there was a film studio. Within a year of his debut in 1914 he had made more than 50 shorts and would continue to work as prolifically for the rest of the decade.He first met British comic Stan Laurel on set in 1917 and their paths would cross several times before their partnership began in earnest a decade later. With their contrasting appearances and styles, Laurel and Hardy's slapstick antics were seen in more than 100films and, unlike many of their contemporaries, they successfully made the transition from silent films to talkies.Their movies continued to be commercially successful into the 1950s until health problems forced Mr Hardy to take a break after Atoll K (1951). Despite efforts to lose weight (he shed over 150 pounds in a matter of months), he suffered two debilitating strokes before dying at the age of 65.He was married three times, most successfully to Virginia Lucille Jones who was by his side from 1940 until his death.
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