One of the most popular comedy teams of the sound era, Abbott and Costello enjoyed enormous success in the 1940s and early 1950s before their brand of inspired childish humor was supplanted by that of the Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis team. Slender, streetwise Bud Abbott was the straight man; the laugh maker was short, round, and innocent Lou Costello. Their humor was hardly sophisticated; yet it was decidedly verbal. Unlike such comedy teams as the Marx Brothers, Laurel and Hardy, and even the Three Stooges, Abbott and Costello had virtually no visual style - even their physical comedy consisted of little more than Costello's fumbling with his hat. But the team's clever vaudeville-type routines, with the pair bantering back and forth and completely misunderstanding each other, have become legendary.
William A. “Bud” Abbott's parents worked as circus performers, and they inspired their son to pursue a show business career of his own. It was a long time in coming, however. When Abbott was 15, he was shanghaied and forced to work as a sailor on a boat heading for Europe. Throughout his 20s and most of his 30s, he tried to make a career of entertainment but without success. He had all but given up and was working as a cashier at a Brooklyn vaudeville house in 1931 when a young comic named Lou Costello reported that his partner was sick. Abbott filled in as Costello's straight man that night, and a new comedy team was born.
Louis Francis Cristillo, later known simply as Lou Costello, had an odd assortment of early jobs that included selling newspapers, soda jerking, and working in a hat shop. At one time, he was a rather unlikely prizefighter. Determined to make it in show business, he quit the ring in the late 1920s and made his way to Hollywood. The best he could do, though, was to become a stuntman, at one point assuming the extraordinary responsibility of doubling for Dolores del Rio. After joining up, the team honed their routines on the vaudeville and burlesque circuits until they got their big break in 1938, appearing on Kate Smith's popular radio show. They quickly became radio favorites, which led to their appearance in the Broadway revue, Streets of Paris, with Carmen Miranda.
Hollywood beckoned and Abbott and Costello were hired by UNIVERSAL PICTURES as comic relief in an innocuous musical called One Night in the Tropics (1940). Audiences roared at the antics of the two comedians and Universal promptly signed the team to a long-term contract. They were the stars of their next film, Buck Privates (1941). Buck Privates, a service comedy, was a huge hit and was followed quickly by comic romps in two other branches of the military in In the Navy (1941) and Keep 'em Flying (1941). The pair made a total of five films in 1941 and their combined success put Abbott and Costello among Hollywood's top 10 box-office draws. Except for the years 1945–47, they would sustain that level of popularity until 1951.
The comedy of Abbott and Costello was silly and escapist and, therefore, particularly well suited to help balance the urgency of the war years. The team's early 1940s films, such as Who Done It? (1942), Hit the Ice (1943), Lost in a Harem (1944), and The Naughty Nineties (1945), were pleasant, simple comedies. Bud and Lou were usually supported by goodlooking contract players who were involved in an insipid love story, a setup similar to that of the later Marx Brothers movies. Their films came to life only when the team launched into one of their famous dialogues, such as the immortal “Who's on First?” routine.
In the mid-1940s, after the war, Abbott and Costello's popularity took a nosedive. Films such as Little Giant (1946) and The Wistful Widow of Wagon Gap (1947) suggested that America's love affair with Bud and Lou was over. The team tried to recapture past glory by making films such as The Time of Their Lives, a comic fantasy story reminiscent of their 1941 hit, Hold That Ghost. They even resorted to making Buck Privates Come Home (1947) in the hope of reminding audiences of their first big hit. It was all to no avail.
Except for the occasional loanout to other studios, most of Abbott and Costello's films had been made at Universal Pictures, a studio whose main strength had always been its horror films. In the hope of reviving the popularity of their premier comedy team, Universal decided to combine its two biggest assets in one film, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948). The movie boasted supporting performances by Glenn Strange as the Frankenstein Monster, Bela Lugosi as Dracula, and Lon Chaney Jr. as the Wolf Man. The result of Universal's experiment was arguably Abbott and Costello's best, most consistently funny film. It was also, as Universal had hoped, a big success at the box office.
The unfortunate consequence of Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein's success was that it spawned a formula that seemed as if it would no sooner die than Dracula himself. With numbing regularity, the team starred in weak movies with repetitious titles: Abbott & Costello Meet the Killer (1949), Abbott & Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1950), Abbott & Costello Meet Captain Kidd (1952), Abbott & Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1953), Abbott & Costello Meet the Keystone Kops (1955), and Abbott & Costello Meet the Mummy (1955). The pair made other films during these years, but their comedy was as uninspired as their horror/comedy formula movies. In the early 1950s, though, the team starred in a TV series, The Abbott and Costello Show, that reprised many of their best vaudeville routines. A new generation was weaned on the syndicated reruns of their TV series, which led to the later rediscovery of their movies on television.
Abbott and Costello's last film together was Dance With Me Henry (1956). They produced the movie themselves and witnessed it painfully flop at the box office. Abbott soon thereafter announced his retirement, but Costello went on to make one solo film, The Thirty-Foot Bride of Candy Rock (1959). He died of a heart attack, however, before the movie was released to poor reviews and even worse receipts. Both Bud Abbott and Lou Costello had tax trouble with the government and found themselves in financial difficulties at the end of their lives. Bud Abbott suffered still more, however, when he was crippled by a series of strokes, beginning in 1964. He died in a retirement home 10 years later.
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