Abbott and Costello - Watch Order: Release Order

1940 - 195636 Films48h 41m3.3 Average

Abbott and Costello were the most popular comedy team of the 1940s and early 1950s, creating a massive 36-film legacy that showcased their vaudeville-honed routines and impeccable timing. From their breakout hit Buck Privates to their final collaboration Dance with Me, Henry, the duo perfected a formula of Abbott as the scheming straight man and Costello as the lovable buffoon.

Most films are standalone comedies with new characters and settings, connected only by the duo's consistent comedic personas and recurring gags like the famous "Who's on First?" routine. This complete filmography includes their Universal Pictures contract films, their glossier MGM productions, and their later independent works that gave them more creative control.

1
One Night in the Tropics poster

One Night in the Tropics

19401h 22m2.9
Director: A. Edward Sutherland
Cast: Allan Jones, Nancy Kelly, Robert Cummings, Bud Abbott, Lou Costello

Jim "Lucky" Moore, an insurance salesman, comes up with a novel policy for his friend, Steve: a 'love insurance policy', that will pay out $1-million if Steve does not marry his fiancée, Cynthia. The upcoming marriage is jeopardized by Steve's ex-girlfriend, Mickey, and Cynthia's disapproving Aunt Kitty. The policy is underwritten by a nightclub owner, Roscoe, who sends two enforcers - Abbott and Costello - to ensure that the wedding occurs as planned.

MusicComedy
2
Buck Privates poster

Buck Privates

19411h 24m3.8
Director: Arthur Lubin
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Lee Bowman, Jane Frazee, Alan Curtis

Petty con artists Slicker Smith and Herbie Brown mistakenly join the Army evading the cops. The cop chasing them winds up as their drill instructor. A rich young man and his former working class chauffeur are not only in the same unit, they're vying for a pretty girl who seems attracted to both.

ComedyMusicWar
3
In the Navy poster

In the Navy

19411h 26m3.5
Director: Arthur Lubin
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Dick Powell, Claire Dodd, Laverne Andrews

Popular crooner Russ Raymond abandons his career at its peak and joins the Navy using an alias, Tommy Halstead. However, Dorothy Roberts, a reporter, discovers his identity and follows him in the hopes of photographing him and revealing his identity to the world. Aboard the Alabama, Tommy meets up with Smoky and Pomeroy, who help hide him from Dorothy, who hatches numerous schemes in an attempt to photograph Tommy/Russ being a sailor.

ComedyMusicWar
4
Hold That Ghost poster

Hold That Ghost

19411h 26m3.9
Director: Arthur Lubin
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Richard Carlson, Joan Davis, Mischa Auer

Two bumbling service station attendants are left as the sole beneficiaries in a gangster's will. Their trip to claim their fortune is sidetracked when they are stranded in a haunted house along with several other strangers.

ComedyHorror
5
Keep 'Em Flying poster

Keep 'Em Flying

19411h 26m3.1
Director: Arthur Lubin
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Martha Raye, Carol Bruce, William Gargan

When a barnstorming stunt pilot decides to join the air corps, his two goofball assistants decide to go with him. Since the two are Abbott & Costello, the air corps doesn't know what it's in for.

Comedy
6
Ride 'Em Cowboy poster

Ride 'Em Cowboy

19421h 26m3.1
Director: Arthur Lubin
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Dick Foran, Anne Gwynne, Johnny Mack Brown

Two peanut vendors at a rodeo show get in trouble with their boss and hide out on a railroad train heading west. They get jobs as cowboys on a dude ranch, despite the fact that neither of them knows anything about cowboys, horses, or anything else.

ComedyWestern
7
Rio Rita poster

Rio Rita

19421h 31m3.1
Director: S. Sylvan Simon
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Kathryn Grayson, John Carroll, Patricia Dane

Doc and Wishey run into some Nazi-agents, who want to smuggle bombs into the USA from a Mexican border hotel.

ComedyMusic
8
Pardon My Sarong poster

Pardon My Sarong

19421h 24m3.6
Director: Erle C. Kenton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Virginia Bruce, Robert Paige, Lionel Atwill

A pair of bus drivers accidentally steal their own bus. With the company issuing a warrant for their arrest, they tag along with a playboy on a boat trip that finds them on a tropical island, where a jewel thief has sinister plans for them.

Comedy
9
Who Done It? poster

Who Done It?

19421h 17m4
Director: Erle C. Kenton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Patric Knowles, Louise Allbritton, Mary Wickes

Two dumb soda jerks dream of writing radio mysteries. When they try to pitch an idea at a radio station, they end up in the middle of a real murder when the station owner is killed during a broadcast.

ComedyMystery
10
It Ain't Hay poster

It Ain't Hay

19431h 20m3.5
Director: Erle C. Kenton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Grace McDonald, Cecil Kellaway, Eugene Pallette

Abbot and Costello must find a replacement for a woman's horse they accidentally killed after feeding it some candy. They head for the racetrack, find a look-a-like and take it. They do not realize that the nag is "Tea Biscuit," a champion racehorse.

Comedy
11
Hit the Ice poster

Hit the Ice

19431h 22m3.1
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Ginny Simms, Patric Knowles, Elyse Knox

After Flash Fulton and Weejie McCoy take pictures of a bank robbery, they're lured to the mountain resort hideout of the robbers, where they meet an old friend and his band.

Comedy
12
Lost in a Harem poster

Lost in a Harem

19441h 29m2.7
Director: Charles Reisner
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marilyn Maxwell, John Conte, Douglass Dumbrille

Two bumbling magicians help a Middle Eastern prince regain his rightful throne from his despotic uncle.

Comedy
13
In Society poster

In Society

19441h 15m3.1
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marion Hutton, Kirby Grant, Ann Gillis

Two bumbling plumbers are hired by a socialite to fix a leak. A case of mistaken identity gets the pair an invitation to a fancy party and an entree into high society. As expected, things don't go too smoothly.

ComedyActionCrimeMusic
14
Here Come the Co-Eds poster

Here Come the Co-Eds

19451h 30m3
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Martha O'Driscoll, Peggy Ryan, Lon Chaney Jr.

Molly, her brother, Slats, and his pal, Oliver, are taxi dancers at the Miramar Ballroom. As a publicity stunt, Slats plants an article about Molly claiming her ambition is to earn enough money to attend staid, all-girl Bixby College. Bixby's progressive dean offers Molly a scholarship. Molly accepts on the condition that Slats and Oliver come along too as campus caretakers. But the pompous Chairman threatens to foreclose on the school's mortgage if Molly isn't expelled. Together, the trio, with the help of some new friends, concocts a scheme to raise enough money to save the school. The plan involves a bet on the Bixby basketball team, which is playing in a game rated at 20 to 1 by the local bookie. But the bookie has other plans for their dough and hires a group of ringers to step in for the opponents. All is not lost, at least while Oliver has the chance to turn things around for his friends-one way or another.

Comedy
15
The Naughty Nineties poster

The Naughty Nineties

19451h 16m3.9
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Alan Curtis, Rita Johnson, Henry Travers

In the gay '90s, cardsharps take over a Mississippi riverboat from a kindly captain. Their first act is to change the showboat into a floating gambling house. A ham actor and his bumbling sidekick try to devise a way to help the captain regain ownership of the vessel.

Comedy
16
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in Hollywood poster

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in Hollywood

19451h 23m3
Director: S. Sylvan Simon
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Frances Rafferty, Bob Haymes, Jean Porter

When two bumbling barbers act as agents for a talented but unknown singer, they stage a phony murder in order to get him a plum role.

Comedy
17
Little Giant poster

Little Giant

19461h 30m2.7
Director: William A. Seiter
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Jacqueline deWit, Brenda Joyce, George Cleveland

Lou Costello plays a country bumpkin vacuum-cleaner salesman, working for the company run by the crooked Bud Abbott. To try to keep him under his thumb, Abbott convinces Costello that he's a crackerjack salesman. This comedy is somewhat like "The Time of Their Lives," in that Abbott and Costello don't have much screen time together and there are very few vaudeville bits woven into the plot.

Comedy
18
The Time of Their Lives poster

The Time of Their Lives

19461h 22m4
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marjorie Reynolds, Binnie Barnes, John Shelton

Two ghosts, who were mistakenly branded as traitors during the Revolutionary War, return to 20th century New England to retrieve a letter from George Washington which would prove their innocence.

ComedyFantasyHorror
19
Buck Privates Come Home poster

Buck Privates Come Home

19471h 17m3.5
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Tom Brown, Joan Shawlee, Nat Pendleton

Two ex-soldiers return from overseas--one of them having smuggled into the country a French orphan girl he has become attached to. They wind up running into their old sergeant--who hates them--and getting involved with a race-car builder who's trying to find backers for a new midget racer he's building.

ComedyRomanceAction
20
The Wistful Widow of Wagon Gap poster

The Wistful Widow of Wagon Gap

19471h 18m3.4
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marjorie Main, Audrey Young, George Cleveland

Chester Wooley and Duke Egan are travelling salesmen who make a stopover in Wagon Gap, Montana while enroute to California. During the stopover, a notorious criminal is murdered, and the two are charged with the crime.

ComedyWestern
21
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein poster

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein

19481h 23m4.1
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Lon Chaney Jr., Bela Lugosi, Glenn Strange

Baggage handlers Bud and Lou accidentally stumble upon Frankenstein's Monster, Dracula and the Wolf Man.

HorrorComedy
22
Mexican Hayride poster

Mexican Hayride

19481h 18m2.9
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Virginia Grey, Luba Malina, John Hubbard

Two con men selling phony stock flee to Mexico ahead of the law, where they run into a woman friend from their earlier days, who is now a bullfighter.

ComedyRomance
23
The Noose Hangs High poster

The Noose Hangs High

19481h 17m3.9
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Joseph Calleia, Leon Errol, Cathy Downs

Two window washers who are mistaken by Nick Craig, a bookie, as the messengers he sent for to pick up $50,000. Now the person he sent them to sent two of his men to get the money back but they found out about it. So they try to mail to Craig but a mix up has the money sent somewhere else and the woman who got it spent it. Now Craig needs the money to pay off one of his clients.

Comedy
24
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff poster

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff

19491h 24m3.6
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Boris Karloff, Lenore Aubert, Gar Moore

Lost Caverns Hotel bellhop Freddie Phillips is suspected of murder. Swami Talpur tries to hypnotize Freddie into confessing, but Freddie is too stupid for the plot to work. Inspector Wellman uses Freddie to get the killer (and it isn't the Swami).

ComedyHorrorMystery
25
Africa Screams poster

Africa Screams

19491h 19m3
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Clyde Beatty, Frank Buck, Buddy Baer

When bookseller Buzz cons Diana into thinking that his friend Stanley knows all there is to know about Africa, they are abducted and ordered to lead Diana and her henchmen to an African tribe in search of a fortune in jewels.

ComedyAdventure
26
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in the Foreign Legion poster

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in the Foreign Legion

19501h 20m3.3
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Patricia Medina, Walter Slezak, Douglass Dumbrille

Jonesy and Lou are in Algeria looking for a wrestler they are promoting. Sergeant Axmann tricks them into joining the Foreign Legion, after which they discover Axmann's collaboration with the nasty Sheik Hamud El Khalid.

ComedyAdventure
27
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet the Invisible Man poster

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet the Invisible Man

19511h 23m3.5
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Nancy Guild, Arthur Franz, Adele Jergens

As novice detectives, Bud and Lou come face to face with the Invisible Man.

HorrorComedyScience Fiction
28
Comin' Round the Mountain poster

Comin' Round the Mountain

19511h 17m3.2
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Dorothy Shay, Kirby Grant, Joe Sawyer

Al Stewart and Wilbert are magicians doing a stage act when they run into Wilbert's cousin, Dorothy McCoy. They find out that Wilbert's grandfather, Squeeze-box McCoy, had treasure hidden in the hills of Kentucky, which they go to find.

ComedyMusic
29
Jack and the Beanstalk poster

Jack and the Beanstalk

19521h 18m2.9
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Buddy Baer, Dorothy Ford, Barbara Brown

A young boy trades the family cow for magic beans. Ascending the beanstalk with the butcher who sold him the beans, he faces the giant terrorizing his village.

ComedyFantasyMusic
30
Lost in Alaska poster

Lost in Alaska

19521h 16m3.2
Director: Jean Yarbrough
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Mitzi Green, Tom Ewell, Bruce Cabot

After two volunteer firemen rescue a gold prospector from suicide, they discover that the police mistakenly want them for murder.

ComedyAdventure
31
Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd poster

Abbott and Costello Meet Captain Kidd

19521h 10m3.1
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Charles Laughton, Hillary Brooke, Bill Shirley

Two hapless waiters in a tavern on the Spanish Main play cupid between aristocratic Lady Jane and tavern co-worker Bruce Martindale, but the two bumpkins mix-up a love letter with Captain Kidd's treasure map of Skull Island, leading to them being kidnapped and taken off to the notorious pirate's island.

ComedyMusicAdventure
32
Abbott and Costello Go to Mars poster

Abbott and Costello Go to Mars

19531h 17m2.8
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Mari Blanchard, Robert Paige, Horace McMahon

Lester and Orville accidentally launch a rocket which is supposed to fly to Mars. Instead it goes to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. They are then forced by bank robber Mugsy and his pal Harry to fly to Venus where they find a civilization made up entirely of women, men having been banished.

ComedyScience Fiction
33
Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde poster

Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

19531h 17m3.5
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Boris Karloff, Craig Stevens, Helen Westcott

As American policemen in London, Bud and Lou meet up with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

ComedyHorrorMysteryScience Fiction
34
Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops poster

Abbott and Costello Meet the Keystone Kops

19551h 20m3.3
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Fred Clark, Lynn Bari, Maxie Rosenbloom

Harry and Willie are scammed into buying the Thomas Edison studio lot by a man named Gorman. They decide to follow Gorman's trail to Hollywood where, unbeknownst to them, he has taken the identity of a foreign film director. The lads wind up as stunt doubles in film the which Gorman is now shooting, while the conman tries to have the bungling pair done away with before they realize who he really is.

Comedy
35
Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy poster

Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy

19551h 19m3.2
Director: Charles Lamont
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marie Windsor, Michael Ansara, Dan Seymour

Stranded in Egypt, Bud and Lou find themselves in the buried tomb of a living mummy.

AdventureHorrorComedyFantasy
36
Dance with Me, Henry poster

Dance with Me, Henry

19561h 19m2.5
Director: Charles Barton
Cast: Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Gigi Perreau, Rusty Hamer, Mary Wickes

Bud and Lou are the owners of the amusement park Kiddieland. Bud, a compulsive gambler, gets in trouble with the mob, and Lou finds himself struggling to keep his adopted children. When Bud is forced to make a shady deal, Lou tries to arrange a deal with the DA, but winds up framed for murder.

Comedy