He returns to work.
He agrees to star in Babes in Toyland, but only if he is permitted to adapt the script in his usual manner. Hal Roach consents, if reluctantly. Hal Roach’s script is for a family picture featuring the names of his two biggest stars above the title, but with a great deal of secondary business going on around them. Hal Roach fears that what he will get back is a vehicle for his two biggest stars, tailored to their strengths but also indulgent of their weaknesses.
Babes in Toyland is a success, but Hal Roach derives no pleasure from it. Babes in Toyland is not the great adornment to the studio for which Hal Roach has worked so hard, and its existence is tainted by the battles fought with one of its stars. Worse, that same star is now pronouncing it to be the most entertaining of their features, he who fought so hard against making it, he who forced its postponement, he who cost Hal Roach time and money and effort, he who showed Hal Roach no gratitude, no gratitude at all.
And Hal Roach will never forgive him.