Come Clean

Come Clean is one of Laurel & Hardy's domestic comedies in which they're each married. Here the boys must grapple with their perennial ethical dilemma: when they get into trouble, should they tell their wives the truth or try to bluff it out? Needless to say, they always try to bluff it out, which only makes matters worse. And man, do they get into trouble this time! The situation in Come Clean is decidedly darker than usual and surprisingly risqué, i.e. about as "Pre-Code" as anything the boys ever encountered. The plot involves a suicidal woman named Kate with a mysterious criminal past who punishes Stan & Ollie for saving her life, refusing to leave them in peace unless she's given money. Kate is portrayed by the formidable Mae Busch, who played a similar role as a blackmailing ex-girlfriend in the silent comedy Love 'Em and Weep and its talkie remake Chickens Come Home. She raised plenty of hell in those incarnations, but here she is a bundle of sheer malevolence. Kate is the middle-class husband's nightmare: a crazy gold-digger with nothing to lose. She responds to good will gestures with contempt, and threatens to scream the place down if she doesn't get her way. And Mae sure could scream!

Recently I saw this short comedy again for the first time in many years, and while it's not at the very top of my L&H's Greatest Hits list it's nice to report that Come Clean stands as one of their funniest domestic comedies. (And hey, how often is it that you watch a movie you haven't seen since grade school and still enjoy it?) In getting reacquainted with this film I realized I'd misremembered a major detail: in my memory Mae Busch's character was a prostitute, perhaps because of her Anna Christie-like outfit, her demeanor, and her demands for money, but in fact we never learn exactly what she does for a living or why the police are looking for her, or why they're offering such a generous reward for her capture. $1,000 was not small change in the depths of the Great Depression! Perhaps Kate is a gangster's moll, or maybe she's a crook who lost her ill-gotten gains somehow, but we never find out and have to fill in this gap on our own for the story to make any sense. In a way, however, Kate's past is irrelevant, because her true function here is to cause Stan and Ollie grief, and this she does with ruthless efficiency.

A bare plot outline for Come Clean would suggest it's a pretty grim excuse for a comedy, but actually the laughs begin almost immediately and seldom let up. The opening sequence is a reworking of a routine the guys first performed in their silent comedy Should Married Men Go Home?, but it works better with sound; this is the bit where Ollie and his wife hope to have a pleasant evening at home by themselves but are interrupted by the unexpected and unwelcome arrival of Mr. & Mrs. Laurel. The Hardys pretend to be out as the Laurels ring their buzzer, but give the game away when Stan slips a note halfway under the door and Ollie foolishly pulls it through while they're still watching. Oops! A lot of forced conviviality follows this faux pas, and when the boys go out to buy ice cream we observe that much of the humor (as in the best Laurel & Hardy comedies) comes not from elaborate gags or chases but in the little moments: just trying to exit the apartment, for instance, Stan & Ollie confound each other repeatedly. After that, the visit to the ice cream parlor is an exercise in confusion and barely-averted hostilities, due mainly to Stan's ineptitude but thanks in part to ice cream vendor Charlie Hall, an actor who must have been put on this earth to serve as a surly nemesis for our heroes.

Once Mae Busch's world-weary Kate has entered the picture, i.e. after the boys have rescued her from a watery grave, the situation turns scary for them and grimly funny for the viewer. When she learns the guys are married she knows instantly that their wives will jump to the obvious conclusion if they catch her lounging around the Hardys' boudoir, wearing one of Mrs. Hardy's negligees-- and she's quite right, of course. Kate insists on going home with them, forcing them to hide her from their wives. Ensconced in the master bedroom, Kate is in no mood to be quiet and when she blasts the radio the boys' attempts to drown out the noise cracked me up when I was a kid and did so again when I saw the film the other day. The ending feels quite abrupt, however, leaving those aforementioned unexplained plot points and suggesting that this two-reel comedy might have benefited from an additional reel. But even as it stands, Come Clean is a brisk, amusing and slightly naughty comedy with dark undertones, and a stark demonstration that no good deed goes unpunished in this world.

The Hardy's are planning for a nice evening in when the Laurels come knocking. When they can't pretend to be out any longer, they let the Laurel's in and Stan and Oliver go out to buy some ice cream. On the way home they see a woman drowning in the river and save her. Less than grateful the woman follows them home and the duo try to hide her from their wives. Meanwhile the police continue their hunt for a wanted woman.

In terms of plot, this short is quite weak. The main plot doesn't really happen till the end of the short and, even then, it doesn't really make any sense and it feels like the writers had an idea about L&H hiding a woman in their home but couldn't work out a better way of setting it up. Aside from this the opening of the film is good, as is the scene in the ice cream shop. The scenes involving hiding Kate from their wives are OK but the final short is quite underplayed considering how quite funny it is.

Laurel and Hardy play their parts well. Laurel has some very good scenes of his trademark confusion early on and Hardy does well without dominating the film in the way it is often easy for him to do. Busch does OK as the wanted woman but I couldn't understand her part one little bit!

Aside from these complaints the short still contained enough funny moments to be worth watching. It's just a little distracting that the writers came up with the basic sequences first then trying to crow bar them into a poor plot.

The beginning of this film is an almost exact copy of SHOULD MARRIED MEN GO HOME, as Ollie and his wife are trying to spend a quiet evening ALONE, but Stanley (and in this case with his wife) show up unannounced. Ollie and his wife hide and pretend they aren't home, but to no avail. Then, you soon notice that Ollie's wife is a pretty bossy and mean piece of work and she begins nagging him unmercifully. Stan wants ice cream, so he and Ollie leave to bring some back for everyone. On the way back, they catch a woman who appears to be trying to drown herself. Instead of being grateful, she is a major pest who follows them home and tries to make their lives miserable (a rather unbelievable turn of events, I know). And the last portion of the film consists of the boys trying in vain to stop this woman from revealing herself to the wives.

As far as the film goes, it's funny stuff, but also pretty forced. It's awfully familiar and ordinary. Not a bad film, but also not particularly memorable.

No question Mae Busch, a famous silent film actress in her day, proved to be the absolutely best foil for Laurel and Hardy. Mae made a successful transition to sound films, replete with a good voice and ready to SCREAM bloody murder if necessary!

Here, Stan and Ollie go out to get some ice cream for their "not too happy" wives and just happen to save larcenous Mae from drowning? Mae is at her best, setting up the boys to pay her off -- BIG TIME --or she'll tell the cops (and their wives) they tried to KILL her. What a bucket of suds they step into.

After a few failed attempts to ditch her, they reluctantly bring Mae home? Ollie stashes her in the bedroom (while Stan is telling a dirty joke to the wives about some farmer's daughter?...) INSANE. Charlie Hall, who plays the ice cream salesman here, was also credited for co-writing the film short, and got the job done.

Naturally, the story builds on itself; the boys play hide and seek with Mae, attempting to hide her around the apartment so the wives won't catch on. Both campy and suggestive material, definitely in the pre-code category of the 1930s, and you have to admit, audiences loved it. In fact, this type of risque storyline made Laurel and Hardy enormously popular through the years, inspiring the sex romps of the 60s and 70s, even sitcoms like LOVE, AMERICAN STYLE.

Two notes; Future director Gordon Douglas has a bit as a hotel desk clerk. He began his career working as a writer and casting director for producer Hal Roach. Spanish actress Linda Loredo, who plays Stan's wife, died suddenly after this production following an emergency appendectomy, at age 24. She also acted for Roach in his Spanish-speaking productions.

Get the Laurel and Hardy short film dvd box set for classics like this. Thanks again to METV Plus for running these golden oldies nightly, and MOVIES Net for featuring them Saturday mornings.

Keep fooling those women. Stan and Ollie are married and living in relative luxury. They see so much of each other that when the Laurels want to come over, the Hardys try to avoid them. It doesn't work and they end up together. Soon the boys go out for ice cream (apparently a regular event because this is not the only time). They end up with the miserable Charlie Hall making this a hard proposition. While out, they save a suicidal woman from drowning. Instead of gratitude, she begins to extort them for money to be quiet about having dealings with her. Modern audiences would recognize her as a hooker. The police are after her and are offering a huge reward. The fun starts as she makes her way to their home and dresses in the wive's clothing. Of course, the job now is to hide this woman from the wives till they can pay her off. Mae Busch is sort of tragic as the woman. Ollie does get the last word in the final scene.