Photo stars

[abacus]

Or should the title be called seeing stars? I was wondering when photo's of the comic strip stars were introduced into comics .The first I can recall are the photo's of Laurel and Hardy in the top left hand corner of the Film Fun covers and since there were many issues they must have had an enormous bank of photo's to choose from.At the same time I can recall U.S. western comics featuring photo portraits of cowboy stars on many of their western covers.

[paw broon]

Someone with more knowledge of British comics would have to answer the one about when photos were used in our weeklies. I do know that Radio Fun used publicity shots of stars at the top of their stories. While it started publication in 1938, I'm not sure if there were photos that early.
As for American comics, both Fawcett westerns and Dell used photo covers of cowboy stars, incl. Tom Mix, Monte Hale, Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Gabby Hayes and so on. Some romance titles also featured photo covers. Here's an example

[Lew Stringer]

Someone with more knowledge of British comics would have to answer the one about when photos were used in our weeklies. I do know that Radio Fun used publicity shots of stars at the top of their stories. While it started publication in 1938, I'm not sure if there were photos that early.

Yes, here's a few pages from Radio Fun No.3 (1938) that carried photos on the title banners.

https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2012 ... n-no3.html

Presumably Film Fun was already doing it by then too. Photo banners were certainly in the first Film Fun Annual, published in 1937...

https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2007 ... -1938.html

[abacus]

With the mention of Film Fun some time ago at a carboot sale I came across a seller with some Laurel and Hardy magazines for sale with some containing a reprint of a complete comic story from Film Fun annual ,prior to this I didn't know this magazine existed.Selected one with a cover I liked even though I have got the annual this particular strip comes from.Maybe Laurel and Hardy are not so popular these days but for some who like pics

and a glance at some of the pages

A magazine for fans, eh?

[philcom55]

I love Laurel & Hardy, but I'm afraid I never found the Film Fun version very funny. It's a shame we didn't get to see what Roy Wilson or Reg Parlett could have done with them!

[abacus]

I love Laurel & Hardy, but I'm afraid I never found the Film Fun version very funny. It's a shame we didn't get to see what Roy Wilson or Reg Parlett could have done with them!

Personally I prefered the antics on the cover of Film Fun to the rest of the characters inside the comic.This may have been because the artwork lends itself well when contrasting the stature of the leading duo, (fat and thin) , can you say that? Reminiscent of Weary Willie and tired tim in Chips and even Don Quixote and Sancho Panza illustrations.

[philcom55]

To be honest I've never been a fan of any of the humorous strips in Film Fun under Fred Cordwell's editorship (though I know that many people are and were). George and Terry Wakefield drew a generic comedy duo which featured a fat man and a thin man, but for me they just weren't Laurel and Hardy. By contrast Reg Parlett captured Tony Hancock and Sid James to perfection during the comic's final years.

[Lew Stringer]

With the mention of Film Fun some time ago at a carboot sale I came across a seller with some Laurel and Hardy magazines for sale with some containing a reprint of a complete comic story from Film Fun annual ,prior to this I didn't know this magazine existed.Selected one with a cover I liked even though I have got the annual this particular strip comes from.Maybe Laurel and Hardy are not so popular these days but for some who like pics

I subscribe to that mag. It's for members of the appreciation society. They do 3 or 4 a year. Very few pages but it's a nice mag to support.
http://www.laurelandhardy.org

Re: Phil's comments about Film Fun; yeah, Cordwell had a strange insistence on how the strips should look, so it was a peculiar comic at times under his editorship. (It was my dad's favourite comic though in the late 1920s/early 1930s.)