LAUREL & HARDY (STAN LAUREL) - AUTOGRAPHED SIGNED CHECK 05/20/1938 - HFSID 30840

LAUREL & HARDY: STAN LAUREL and RUTH LAUREL
Check to Stan's former and future wife in the year she crashed his honeymoon
Check signed: "Stan Laurel", endorsed on verso "Mrs Ruth Laurel/I W Stanburger", 8¼x3. Culver City, California, 1938 May 20. Check No. 124 drawn on Stan Laurel's personal account at the Bank of America, payable to Mrs Ruth Laurel for $50.00. Accompanied by an unsigned copy of a letter to Ruth Laurel in Los Angeles from Stan Laurel's secretary at the Hal Roach Studios, dated 1938 May 20, stating that the check represents 5% of compensation paid to him by the studio on his current production. Stan LAUREL (1890-1965), born Arthur Stanley Jefferson in Ulverston, England, toured the U.S. in 1910 and 1912 as Charlie Chaplin's understudy. He stayed in America to appear on vaudeville and in several comedy shorts, including one with an accidental pairing with Oliver Hardy (1892-1957), Lucky Dog, in 1918. In 1926, after separate careers, Laurel and Hardy worked together once more for director Hal Roach, who noticed their on-screen chemistry and persuaded them to join forces as a team to make comedies. From 1927-1950, Laurel and Hardy appeared in over 100 movies, including 27 feature films and the 1932 three-reeler, The Music Box, which won an Academy Award for Best Short Subject. In the late 1940s and early 1950s,the comedy legends also toured English music halls as well as continuing to make films. Laurel stopped performing after Hardy's death in 1957, although he appeared in archival appearances in a number of documentaries on comedy legends, including Charlie Chaplin and Laurel and Hardy. It would require a full-length biography to recount Stan Laurel's stormy marriages and divorces. Stan Laurel and Ruth Rogers (Laurel) were married in 1934, divorced in 1936, remarried in 1940, separated in 1941 and divorced for good in 1946. In 1938, the year of this check, Ruth created quite a stir by showing up at the hotel where Laurel was honeymooning with Vera Shuvalova, claiming her own divorce from Stan was not final yet. Stan Laurel finally found happiness with Ida Kitaeva Raphael (Laurel), his spouse from 1946 until his death. Bank stamp on verso shows through lightly at Stan's signature. Cancellation holes, not at signature or endorsement. Fold creases not near signature or endorsement. Overall, fine condition.