Eddie Laughton

Relocating from England to the U.S. in the 1920s, dapper, mustachioed Eddie Laughton worked in vaudeville until he was signed by Columbia Pictures in 1935. Laughton spent most of his time in the studio's two-reel comedies, earning his $55 per day in an exhausting variety of roles: hotel clerks, gangsters, snobbish socialites, jealous lovers, train conductors, and, sometimes, just one of the crowd. The Three Stooges, Columbia's top two-reel attraction, were so impressed by Laughton that they hired him as his straight man for their stage appearances. After toting up hundreds of credits in both shorts and features, Laughton left Columbia in 1945 to free-lance. Retiring in 1949, Eddie Laughton died of pneumonia three years later at the age of 49.