FILM FANS SPEAK UP FOR BIRMINGHAM-BORN SILENT COMIC

A Midlands-born star of the Silent Screen will be brought back into focus in the February edition of online magazine Birmingham Now.

Charlie Hall, born in Erdington in 1899, was regularly paired with Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy, but also worked with other such Hollywood luminaries as Ray Milland, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, Bud Abbott and Lou Costello.

Hall's biographer, John Ullah, is "chief sheik" of the Birmingham branch of the Laurel and Hardy Appreciation Society and successfully campaigned for his local Wetherspoons pub in Erdington to be named after the comedian, who died in 1959.

Both Ullah and the pub's manager, Claire Brickland, were interviewed by Steve Green of Solihull-based Vamporama Films. This is their third such contribution to the show; previous packages focused upon movie producer Patrick Carney and the organisers of the first Black Country Horror Shorts Film Festival.

February's episode will go live on 27 January. Previous instalments, as well as extended edits of selected features, are available on the Birmingham Now YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIjVpJqCyNK_BymjT-fnTdQ

Find out more about Vamporama Films at films.vamporama.co.uk