A Lon Chaney Double-Feature - Hope and Merrye-ment

My Favorite Brunette: There’s Always Hope!

This post is being revamped and republished for the Lon Chaney Blogathon, hosted by Movies Silently and The Last Drive-In, from November 15 through November 18, 2013. Have a thrilling time! We hope you'll enjoy this father-and-son double-feature!

So many of my favorite films have been restored to their original high-quality prints, such as Vertigo, Rear Window, and Touch of Evil, so I was thrilled when The Shout! Factory put out the 5-movie set The Bob Hope Collection, with my favorite Bob movie, the 1947 comedy-thriller My Favorite Brunette (MFB), written by Edmund Beloin & Jack Rose, and directed by Elliott Nugent (the 1939 version of The Cat and the Canary; Never Say Die; The Male Animal).  For my money, this comic gem is the best of Bob Hope’s three movies in the “Favorite” series. The first one, My Favorite Blonde (1942), teamed Hope with Madeleine Carroll in a zany yet suspenseful adventure reminiscent of her Alfred Hitchcock thrillers The 39 Steps (1935) and Secret Agent (1936). The last of the trilogy was My Favorite Spy (1951), in which Hope teamed up for similarly funny, frantic shenanigans with the beautiful and brainy Hedy Lamarr. Although I enjoyed all three “Favorites,” I was drawn most strongly to MFB because it affectionately spoofs one of my favorite genres, private eye mysteries.

I see a fabulous babe in your future!

I guess Mrs. Fong's baby isn't a vegetarian!

We meet our hero Ronnie Jackson (Hope), a successful San Francisco baby photographer, on Death Row—this is comedy?!  Oh yes it is, smarty, because there’s a gaggle of reporters interviewing our hero as he gets a chance to tell his side of the murder frame-up he’s embroiled in. In the true 1940s-style detective voiceover/flashback, Ronnie admits, “I wanted to be a detective, too. It only took brains, courage and a gun—and I had the gun!”

Carlotta Montay has a hush-hush case for our hero!

In flashbacks (this is a film noir spoof, after all, and a darn nifty one!), we find out that before Ronnie found himself embroiled in suspense, romance, and zany shenanigans, he was a successful baby photographer in San Francisco’s Trafalgar Building.  The tenant across the hall is cool, tough private detective Sam McCloud (and wait’ll you see the Paramount star doing a swell cameo as McCloud!).

"All my life, I wanted to be like Humphrey Bogart,
Dick Powell, or even Alan Ladd!

Sam’s just gone out of town on a case.  Before Ronnie can say “mistaken identity,” his dreams of playing shamus come all too true all too soon, when a beautiful, mysterious damsel-in-distress hurries into what’s really Sam McCloud’s office.  She is, as Ronnie describes her in voiceover, a “dark-eyed-dreamboat up to her gorgeous lips in trouble.”  Meet Ronnie’s new client, the lovely and desperate Carlotta Montay (played by the ever-delightful Dorothy Lamour, who went from getting rocked by the 1937 version of The Hurricane, to becoming part of a comedy movie trio with Bob, Bing Crosby, and “Dottie,” as the fellas nicknamed her in their first of their many “Road” comedies, starting with Road To Singapore (1940). Soon the cowardly yet determined Ronnie is up to his ski-nose in trouble as he and his comely client are chased by a gang of cutthroats with designs on Carlotta's uncle's uranium—that's right, uranium, just like in Alfred Hitchcock’s  Notorious!). And what a dastardly bunch they are:

*Jack LaRue* as sinister Tony, from No Orchids for Miss Blandish; Cornered; and of course, Road to Utopia with Hope, Crosby, and Lamour!

*John Hoyt* as Dr. Lundau.  We of Team Bartilucci have affectionately dubbed Hoyt as one of the most angular people on the planet.  Fun Fact from the IMDb: In his early years of performing, he put together a nightclub act doing impressions of famous celebrities. His impersonation of Noel Coward was so good that he was hired for the original Broadway comedy The Man Who Came to Dinner in 1939, in which he played Beverley Carlton, a role obviously based on Coward himself. (The 1942 film version was swell, too!)

*Charles Dingle* as Major Simon Montague, from The Song of Bernadette; The Little Foxes; Duel in the Sun; George Washington Slept Here.

*Peter Lorre,* saving my favorite villain for last!  Lorre’s long career includes the chilling shocker  M; The Maltese Falcon; Casablanca; All Through the Night; *, practically stealing the show as Kismet, the most fearsome of evil Simon Montague’s henchman.  I especially get a kick out of Kismet’s running gag about practicing his citizenship exam while keeping his knife skills sharp; now that’s what I call multitasking!  

But there are good funny folks here, too:
*Jean Wong* Despite not being listed in the film’s credits, Jean Wong practically stole the show for us here at Team Bartilucci HQ as Mrs. Fong, the mother of a toddler (Roland Soo Hoo) who’s so loathe to smile for Ronnie during his attempts to make the little tyke smile, our hero quips, “This kid's gonna grow up to be a sponsor!”  Jean also appeared in The Lady from Shanghai (1947); The Night Has A Thousand Eyes (1948); and The King and I (1956).

* Lon Chaney Jr.* Our star!   The son of Lon Cheney touched my heart with his moving  performance as Lenny in the film version of Of Mice and Men (1939), and did a swell job in the classic horror thrillers The Wolf Man (1941) and The Mummy’s Tomb (1942), among many others.  In MFB, Lon Jr. turns out to have a flair for sending up his classic movie roles, especially from Of Mice and Men, and by golly, I found him downright endearing!   Lon Jr. had more comic talent than people gave him credit for.  The scene with the bars on the doors especially cracked me up!



OUCH!  Ronnie gets knocked down,
but gets back up again...and again!

MFB deftly spoofs hard-boiled private eye thrillers of the era with a barrage of uproarious one-liners and set-pieces. Hope and Lamour's usual comic/romantic chemistry is at its finest. According to the IMDb, the 1940s was a very prolific period for Bob Hope, having made 21 movies during that decade, including Hope and Lamour’s series of “Road” movies; The Paleface with Jane Russell, and My Favorite Blonde (1942) with Madeleine Carroll (who was also married to Sterling Hayden for a time)



Dude, that old guy and that righteous babe came from San Dimas,
where Bill and Ted had those excellent adventures! Awesome!

Fun Facts: According to the IMDb, Elliott Nugent’s grandson, Jonathon Elliott,   had memories to share:  “My grandfather, Elliott Nugent, directed this movie and wrote about it in his autobiography Events Leading up to the Comedy.  Paramount star Alan Ladd got the cool cameo as private eye Sam McCloud on the strength of having directed him in the 1949 version of The Great Gatsby. 

Bob Hope and Bing Crosby had always a long-standing arrangement to do cameos in each other's movies.  In this case, Bing had already done a cameo in Bob's most recent movie, so it wasn't Bing’s turn.  (The IMDb didn’t specifiy which film, but I’m guessing it’s our film, My Favorite Brunette). Nevertheless, Bob was so eager to convince Bing to do this cameo that Bob offered to pay Bing $5,000—which Bing donated to charity, bless him!  Crosby walked onto the set, skipped makeup (he was already made up from another movie he was shooting on the lot anyway), stopped at wardrobe to don a prison guard shirt, and did his bit in one take, leaving the soundstage in just five minutes.  The result: a Hollywood record for the most money per minute paid to an actor!”

My Favorite Lines from My Favorite Brunette:
Ronnie in San Quentin, hearing there’s no word from the Governor about the gas chamber: “No word, huh?  I’ll know who to vote for next time!”

Ronnie faces the gas chamber for reporters, his hands getting shaky:
“It’s not so hard to kick the bucket.  It’s not so tough to walk that last mile.  It’s just hard to light a cigarette, that’s all.”

Female Reporter (Garry Owen): “Was it a woman?”
Ronnie: “It’s always a woman.  And you should have seen this woman.  Skin like smooth satin; beautiful blue eyes; dark silken hair; the kind of a gal who’d make you want to give her your last shirt.  (Pauses to look at his shirt.)  I borrowed this one from the Warden.”

Bob Hope: “You see, I wanted to be a detective too. It only took brains, courage and a gun—and I had the gun!”.

Bob Hope: “I was cut out for this kind of life. All my life I've wanted to be a hard- boiled detective like Humphrey Bogart, or Dick Powell ... or even Alan Ladd!” (Cue Alan Ladd!)

Ronnie arrives at Seacliff Lodge (not realizing it’s an asylum): “What a joint.  Must’ve been something left over from Wuthering Heights.  You know, the kind of a house that looks like you could hunt quail in the hallways?  I didn’t know it then, but I was gonna be the quail.”

Bob Hope (to Peter Lorre): “Nice cheerful place. What time do they bring the mummies out?”

Bob Hope: “It always looked so easy in those Tarzan pictures!”

Ronnie, coming to after Lorre knocked him out: “When I came to, I was playing Post Office with the floor. I had a lump on my head the size of my head.  Inside, Toscanini was conducting the Anvil Chorus with real blacksmiths.  I looked at the bottle of Old Pile Driver  and decided to stick to double malts.”

Bob Hope to Dorothy Lamour: "I don't know how much more of this I can take.  You've had me in hot water so long I feel like a tea bag.”

Ronnie and Carlotta at swanky café:  “The Poule D’Or, where they eat mink for breakfast.”



Carlotta's wheelchair-bound Uncle Stefan makes an
unexpected recovery!  Ronnie's keyhole camera will surely save
Carlotta, her uncle, and the day--if they hurry!

This car chase is making me hungry! Got any Grey Poupon?

Time to open the mailman? Whew, it's just the bad guys messing with us!

In the great tradition of Danny Kaye in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,
Bob Hope as Ronnie finally gets a hot clue!

Is Carlotta giving Ronnie a private screening?

Whatever Carlotta wants, Carlotta gets!



Never bring a psychiatric patient to a knife fight,
especially if Kismet's involved! !

Better luck getting the girl next time, Harry! :-)

 

Spider Baby:
"Just because something isn't good doesn't mean it's bad!"

Very rarely do you come along a film that you can truly describe as seminal.  Psycho was certainly the spiritual father to the slasher genre, and both it and Texas Chainsaw Massacre can be traced back to the real-life madman Ed Gein, but if you had to point to the far larger source of Chainsaw's DNA, it is the mad little film Spider Baby.  From it spawned the deep dark trope well of the Family of Crazies.  Sometimes alluring young ladies, sometimes mutated monsters like in The Hills Have Eyes, but they were first introduced to cinema by way of the Merrye clan.

By this point in his career, Lon Chaney Jr. had either settled into (or been forced into, depending on who you listen to) a steady stream of sad shadows of the classic horror roles, or self-parodies of his great dramatic turn as Lenny in Of Mice and Men, the latter category including the role he played in The Wife's selection above.  So it's rather nice that one of his last films ends up being one of his best performances, filled with compassion and kindness, something by that point, I expect most people forgot he could play.



Most kids play "Doctor" - the Merryes play
"Civil War Doctor"!

"Merrye Syndrome" is a malady specific to the family of the same name - members of the family grow and progress normally until early puberty, after which they begin to regress mentally, not just to childhood, but allegedly to earlier stages of evolution.  Chaney plays Bruno, chauffer and caregiver to the last of the family - young Virginia (Jill Banner) and Elizabeth (Beverly Washburn) and their brother Ralph (Sid Haig).  Ralph has already lost the ability to speak, and never walks when he can crawl, and the girls have grown into young loveliness, while their personalities have remained that of tomboys, with an affinity for insects and violence.

Bruno, following the wishes of their late (?) father, cares for them like he was their own, trying to keep them under control, and away from the prying eyes of neighbors.  But the occasional visitor can causes problems, like when a deliveryman (Mantan Moreland) gets caught in Virginia's "Spider web", who she kills with a series of "stings" with a pair of butcher knives.  Bruno dutifully cleans up after the trio when the unforeseen happens, and calmly tries to remind them how to behave.

But the delivery bring bad news - a lawyer reports that a distant member of the family wishes to take custody of the Merrye trio, and with them, control of the sizable holdings of the family.  Bruno must hastily clean his charges up and make the home look presentable, in the hopes there's no need to take the children away.

It...doesn't work out.

Bruno (Lon Chaney Jr.) cautions the girls to be on their best
behavior - no poison in the vinaigrette, and vivisection
is right out!

Chaney pulls off a solid performance as he cares for the young maniacs.  His final act of protection for the family is both tragic and hilarious, and at the same time, purposefully  hilarious.  He was already suffering from illness and a weakness for the drink by this point, and while it showed on him physically, he gave the role his all, nicely balancing over the top delivery and melodrama. 

As for the Sisters Merrye, Jill Banner died at only 35 in 1982, after only a handful of roles, including several parts on Dragnet, and Snow White in house favorite The President's Analyst.  Beverly Washburn was a child star, and is still working today. She'll be turning seventy this November 25th. 

Quinn Redeker, the family's distant relative, had a 25-year run on The Young and the Restless, after a nearly ten-year stint on The Days of our Lives.  He was also nominated for an Oscar as one of the writers of The Deer Hunter. And I'll lay odds that every personal appearance he makes, some yukkapuck makes him sign a copy of this damn movie.

Sid Haig's mute performance as Bruno is deliciously unsettling from the moment he crawls out of the back of the family's vintage automobile.  When he shows up in a Little Lord Fauntleroy suit halfway through the film, all dolled up to impress the relatives, it only makes him seem odder, especially considering the things he does to them while wearing that suit.  Considering how well he's now known for the film, most of his work was as more general character parts as hoods and unsavory swarthy individuals.  He got to play one of King Tut's minions on Batman, and in the late seventies, I first saw him as Dragos, the bad guy from one of Filmation's forays into live-action, Jason of Star Command.  It's only in recent years has Sid returned to the horror genre, mostly via the work of Rob Zombie, whose House of 1000 Corpses is so spiritually related to Spider Baby as to be as inbred as the Merrye clan itself. 

The film is almost required viewing for fans of horror history, and a delight for fans of dark comedy.  The recent high-quality DVD release is out of print, but not impossible to find, and well worth the search.

Say hi to Uncle Ned for me.

THE GHOST BREAKERS: Havana Frightful Good Time!

As fond as I am of the 1939 version of The Cat & The Canary, the words of that great philosopher Daffy Duck leap to mind:  “If they like that mess, they’re starvin’ for some real hoofin’!”  Well, if Paramount’s 1940 tweaking of The Ghost Breakers (TGB) isn’t the real hoofin’, I don’t know what is!  It’s a premium blend  of snappy comedy, playful romance, and genuine spooky suspense.  Producer Arthur Hornblow, Jr. (Witness for the Prosecution; The Asphalt Jungle; Oklahoma!) reunites The Cat & The Canary co-stars Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard, as well as director George Marshall (The Gazebo; It Started with a Kiss). Their funny, sparkling chemistry together is better than ever, blending warmth, romance, and comedy as deliciously as a daiquiri.  Hope and Goddard are so darling together, I want to hug them and bring them home for the holidays!  (But a DVD will do!)  I like the cheeky references to Paulette Goddard’s Cecil B. DeMille movies, too (Unconquered; Reap the Wild Wind, etc.).

Be very, very quiet; we're hunting ghosts!

Based on the work of Walter DeLeon and based on the play by John Willard and Paul Dickey and Charles W. Goddard (any relation to co-star Paulette Goddard?), the film gets off to an exciting start in New York City during a violent thunderstorm that’s almost worthy of Hurricane Sandy.  “Nice night for a murder,” says our heroine Mary Carter (Goddard) as she packs for her voyage to pre-Castro Cuba.  She only thinks she’s kidding, with all the mystery and intrigue afoot!  You see, Mary’s off to Cuba to claim her family inheritance, Castillo Maldito, or “Black Island.”  Sounds cozy already, huh?  Mary’s mom had told her about Black Island and its sinister legends, but Mary’s a good-natured yet skeptical New Yorker who doesn’t scare easily: “(My mother) also told me about Santa Claus, Snow White, and the Seven Dwarves.”  Of course, her Cuban advisor, Senor Havez (Pedro de Cordoba of Anthony Adverse; The Corsican Brothers; Hitchcock’s Saboteur) gives Mary a last friendly warning: “We must admit there is a dividing line somewhere between superstition and the supernatural.  All I know is that during the last twenty years, no human being who has tried to spend the night in Castillo Maldito ever lived to see a sunrise.”  You never know; I can imagine the eager developers eventually showing up waving contracts for chain restaurants and hotels anytime now!  But Mary gets an urgent phone call from Ramon Medeiros (Anthony Quinn of Road to Singapore and Road to Morocco, as well as winning Best Supporting Actor Oscars for Lust for Life and Viva Zapata!) about her upcoming trip. Alas, whatever it was he wanted to say gets lost in a hail of gunfire, and poor Medeiros is no more.  What was Medeiros trying to tell Mary before everyone got trigger-happy?

"Johnny Ola told me about her! They call her 'Superman'!"


Meanwhile, meet our hero, radio star Larry Lawrence (Hope) and his valet Alex (Willie Best of High Sierra; Cabin in the Sky; and Hope and Goddard’s third film together, Nothing But the Truth). Larry’s full name is in fact Lawrence Lawrence Lawrence, a name so nice they named him thrice!   “My parents had no imagination,” Larry explains.  He and Alex are packing for a fishing trip, but will they end up sleeping with the fishes instead?  You see, as if the storm and the hotel’s resulting blackout weren’t already agita-inducing, Larry’s radio show focuses on dishing the dirt on notorious criminal underworld types. Wouldn’t you know Larry has run afoul of gangster Frenchy Duvall (Paul Fix of After the Thin Man; Dr. Cyclops; and ironically, TV’s The Rifleman, as Marshal Micah Torrence!)?  Now Duvall is out for blood.  Sheesh, underworld types can be so sensitive!  As more gunplay ensues, Larry fears he’s the one who accidentally killed Medeiros, and he and Alex end up unwittingly joining Mary on a slow boat to Cuba! 

Young Richard Carlson as The Man in the White Suit!

Romance blooms for Mary and Larry, though that doesn’t stop others from trying to keep our heroes from reaching Black Island, including Dr. Parada (Paul Lukas of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes; 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea; Watch on the Rhine, the film that won Lukas his Best Actor Oscar), Anthony Quinn again, this time as Ramon Medeiros’ brother Francisco.  Look sharp during the scene at the Las Palmas nightclub with Lloyd Corrigan (Whistling in the Dark; The Big Clock; The Manchurian Candidate; the Boston Blackie movies) for a brief appearance by lovely Dolores Moran (To Have and Have Not; The Horn Blows at Midnight; Old Acquaintance) and a dapper young Richard Carlson (The Little Foxes; The Creature from the Black Lagoon; It Came from Outer Space; and the fact-based 1953 to 1956 TV series I Led Three Lives) as Mary’s old friend Geoff Montgomery. Carlson is in one of my favorite scenes:

Geoff:  “A zombie has no will of his own.  You see them sometimes walking around blindly with dead eyes, following orders, not knowing what they do, not caring.”

Larry:   “You mean like Democrats?”

They won't hear nothin' more
from The Mighty Quinn....

 TGB’s comedy and horror elements blend superbly, with character actor Noble Johnson (King Kong; Jungle Book; The Most Dangerous Game) playing a truly haunting, memorable zombie.  John M. Miller from the TCM Web site notes that TGB pre-dates Val Lewton’s I Walked With A Zombie by three years.  For better or worse, like any actors who were even remotely swarthy, both Anthony Quinn and Noble Johnson were frequently cast in supporting roles at Universal Studios and RKO as Native Americans, Latinos, Arabs, and other so-called “exotic” types. 

...Or will they? He resurrects real good!

TGB’s production values are top notch, from Edith Head’s gorgeous wardrobe for Paulette Goddard, to Hans Dreier and Robert Usher’s Art Direction, to the cinematography of Charles Lang (Charade; Some Like It Hot; How to Steal a Million).  Farciot Edouart’s special effects photography with the ghosts emerging is eerily captivating.

Willie Best was highly praised by none other than his co-star Bob Hope, who said Best was one of the best actors he ever knew—and yet so many people have criticized him, or more specifically, the African-American stereotypes he was called upon to portray. I say you can’t fault a performer (or anyone else) for NOT being ahead of his time!  My dear friend and fellow blogger Becky Barnes of ClassicBecky’s Brain Food renown agrees: “Willie Best was one of the best comedians of the era. It's such a shame things were the way they were then. I think he just about carried The Ghost Breakers, and he deserves acclaim for his work.”  Amen to that, sister!

Bob Hope and Willie Best agree: no comedy-thriller holds a candle to The Ghost Breakers!

 Just as zombies never die, neither do remakes:  The Ghost Breakers was successfully remade in 1953 for Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis as Scared Stiff, with Lizabeth Scott as the heiress-in-distress, including voiceover cameos by Bob Hope and Bing Crosby! 

I think Mary would prefer a free drink or a mint on her pillow!

Ooh, The Zombies!  I loved that band!

Laura, er, Mary is the face in the misty light....

Aha, we've solved the mystery! Mary's ancestor was Dr. Phibes!

Don't you just love a happy ending on the high seas?

The Cat and The Canary (1939) - Cat Ballyhoo!

Where there’s life, there’s Hope—Bob Hope!  Okay, so I borrowed that from an ad line from another one of Hope’s comedies, but the point is, Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard were a delightful team in their first film together, Paramount’s The Cat and The Canary (TC&TC).  Produced by Arthur Hornblow of Witness for the Prosecution fame, and based on John Willard’s original 1922 stage play, the popular thriller was eventually adapted for both stage and screen in 1927 and 1930.  Director Elliott Nugent (My Favorite Brunette, Up in Arms) joined forces with Hope and Goddard for this 1939 version of the story, adding more witty, playful comedy and romance to Willard’s thriller. This version worked so well that Hope and Goddard made two more films together: The Ghost Breakers (1940), and Nothing But the Truth (1941).  For the record, there was also a 1979 version.  I never saw it, but the stars sound promising:  Yanks Carol Lynley and Michael Callan, and Brits Honor Blackman, Wendy Hiller, Edward Fox, Olivia Hussey, Daniel Massey, Peter McEnery, and Wilfrid Hyde-White. But I digress….

 Here's looking at you, kids!

Universal actually owned the rights to Willard’s play, but sold them to Paramount. Fun Fact: the film, along with the 1940 film The Ghost Breakers (which I’ll discuss next time), was an inspiration to Walt Disney for his Haunted Mansion attraction at Disneyland!   Focusing on the funny, The New York Times’ film critic Frank S. Nugent describes Bob Hope not as the thing with feathers a la Emily Dickenson, but as having “a chin like a forehead and a gag line for every occasion… (This version of the story) is more hair-brained than hair-raising, which is as it should be.”  I agree: with this cast, fun and suspense make a swell team, including the delightful Nydia Westman (the 1933 version of Little Women; The Remarkable Andrew; The Ghost and Mr. Chicken) as Cousin Cicily, a charmingly daft flibbertigibbet among the late Cyrus Norman’s relatives.  The supporting cast weren’t small potatoes, either, with George Zucco (The Mummy; After the Thin Man; The Hunchback of Notre Dame) and Gale Sondergaard (Anna and the King of Siam; The Letter; and Best Supporting Actress Oscar-winner for Anthony Adverse).  I especially enjoyed Sondergaard as Miss Lu; she’s kinda like a sophisticated Bayou Mrs. Danvers played for straight-faced laughs, blending mystery, menace, and mirth. Both Zucco and Sondergaard  playfully spoof the more ominous roles they were known for, while still being spooky enough to keep viewers on their toes, blending suspense and comedy into a sparkling cocktail. As Lawyer Crosby (no relation to Hope’s future screen co-star Bing Crosby), George Zucco’s foreboding presence adds the right touch of menace.   

Meet the lady known as Lu!

Hope’s movie career had begun with The Big Broadcast of 1938, and Goddard started her career as a child model, debuting in The Ziegfeld Follies at the tender age of 13!  Goddard’s fame as the Follies’ girl on the crescent moon put her on the map.  She was married to a a millionaire at the age of 16—and divorced not long after that.  After dissolving her marriage in 1931, Goddard went to Hollywood, where her natural talent and beauty sent her stardom soaring, bewitching Hollywood’s elite.  She earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination in the 1943 war drama So Proudly We Hail!  She attracted some pretty remarkable fellas as husbands, too:  Charlie Chaplin; Team Bartilucci fave Burgess Meredith; and author Erich Maria Remarque of All Quiet on the Western Front fame. Goddard also did her bit for higher education, leaving over $20 million to New York University when she died in 1990.  What a gal!

Hello, I’m Mrs. Trumbull! Mrs. Ricardo
recommended me. Anyone need a
babysitter for spectral spooks?

The plot involves a gaggle of distant cousins who’ve come together after 10 years for the reading of Cyrus Norman’s will.  In the great comedy-thriller tradition, the prettiest and most generally winsome gal, Joyce Norman (Goddard) finds herself the designated Lady in Distress, while the affable, quip-slinging actor Wally Campbell (Hope) has noticed how little Joyce has grown up quite nicely.  Attraction is in the air, and no wonder, with the delightful chemistry between Hope and Goddard!  I especially liked the way Wally manages to be brave for Joyce in spite of his nervousness. 

Joyce and Wally ain’t afraid of no ghosts!
That comes later, in The Ghost Breakers!

In addition to Joyce and Wally, the prospective victims, er, heirs include Fred Blythe (John Beal of Double Wedding; My Six Convicts; The Firm); Charlie Wilder (Douglass Montgomery, another 1933 Little Women cast member); and Aunt Susan (Elizabeth Patterson, whose long career included Intruder in the Dust; Lady on a Train; TV’s I Love Lucy as babysitter Mrs. Trumball).  Wally tries to put the others at ease with quips: “I hear old Uncle Cyrus’s ghost is holding bank night.”  What’s more, thanks to Wally’s theatrical background, he can’t help predicting each new spooky suspense cliché, keeping the others’ heads turning suspiciously, prompting Wally to suggest to Joyce, “I’ll recommend a nice quiet bomb-proof cellar to you for the next 30 days.”  Sorry, guys, everybody’s gotta stay overnight whether they want to or not.  As Wally wryly explains, “The members of Local Number 2 of the Bayou Canoe Paddlers and Putt-Putt Pushers Union fold putt after midnight.” Well, that’s OK; Wally and Joyce and company can always while away the time looking for a diamond necklace worth a fortune while trying to avoid being bumped off.

Oops, Joyce grabbed the wrong book.
She was looking for Bazooka Joe’s
bubble gum bio, The Psychology of Fleer!  

On top of the creepy goings-on at ol’ Blue Bayou, the local authorities announce that there’s a fugitive psychopath on the loose from Fairview, the local asylum. “That’s all we needed,” Wally says. “Well, anyway, he’ll feel right at home.”  The killer is known as “The Cat,” but this “Cat” sure isn’t the suave Cary Grant/To Catch A Thief kind of cat burglar!  Soon Wally and Joyce are up to their ears in danger and romance, with more secret panels than The Game Show Network as Miss Lu stirs the pot with ominous warnings and whatnot!  Can Wally and Joyce live happily ever after, “live” being the operative word?  One thing’s for sure: with Hope and Goddard, it’ll sure be fun finding out! 

Hey, Joyce, give a guy a hand!

Fun Facts: 

• According to Wikipedia, Universal owned the rights to Willard’s play and sold them to Paramount Pictures.  Indeed, it inspired Walt Disney to create the original beloved Haunted Mansion at Disneyland!
• Don’t blink during the first scene, or you’ll miss Chief Thundercloud (Hudson’s Bay) as an Indian guide!

If you like The Cat and The Canary, check out other reviews of this fun film by other swell bloggers!

1.) Yvette Banek from her stupendous blog IN SO MANY WORDS from March 2012!

2.) John Greco’s Twenty-Four Frames review from May 2011! 

Also, don't miss an uncredited Charles Lane (Ball of Fire; I Wake Up Screaming, etc.) in the final scene!  I admit it, I'm a sucker for a happy ending, especially a funny one!

Restoring MY FAVORITE BRUNETTE: Is There Hope?

"He's a hilarious hawkshaw...with a case on Dottie!"

Many of my best-loved classic films have been restored to their original pristine (or close to it) condition, such as Vertigo, Rear Window, and Touch of Evil. But it’s always irked me that a full-blown restoration has so far eluded one of my favorite movies, literally: the 1947 comedy-thriller My Favorite Brunette (MFB), written by Edmund Beloin & Jack Rose, and directed by Elliott Nugent. For my money, this comic gem is the best of Bob Hope’s three movies in the “Favorite” series. The first one, My Favorite Blonde (1942), teamed Hope with Madeleine Carroll in a zany yet suspenseful adventure reminiscent of her Alfred Hitchcock thrillers The 39 Steps (1935) and Secret Agent (1936). The last of the trilogy was My Favorite Spy (1951), in which Hope teamed up for similarly funny, frantic shenanigans with the beautiful and brainy Hedy Lamarr. Although I enjoyed all three “Favorites,” I was drawn most strongly to MFB because it affectionately spoofs one of my favorite genres, the private eye mystery. We meet our hero, San Francisco baby photographer Ronnie Jackson (Hope), on Death Row—this is comedy? Oh yes it is, smarty, because there’s a gaggle of reporters interviewing our hero as he gets a chance to tell his side of the murder frame-up he’s embroiled in. In true 1940s-style detective voiceover, Ronnie admits, “I wanted to be a detective too. It only took brains, courage and a gun---and I had the gun!" When Ronnie office-sits for Sam McCloud, the tough, suave private eye down the hall, he finds his dreams of playing detective coming all too true all too soon when a mysterious damsel-in-distress, Baroness Carlotta Montay (no relation to Vertigo’s Carlotta Valdes) slinks into the picture, wearing fabulous Edith Head fashions. Thinking Ronnie is Sam, she begs him to help her find Baron Montay (Frank Puglia in a dual role), her older husband…or is he? 

Time to open the mailman?

I see a babelicious mystery woman in your future....

Whatever Carlotta is to the Baron, her entrance brought a smile to my face immediately, because she’s played by Bob Hope’s quintessential leading lady, Dorothy Lamour, a long way from the exotic Jungle Princess sarong that catapulted her to stardom in the 1930s! Soon Ronnie is up to his ski-nose in trouble as he and the comely Carlotta are chased by a gang of cutthroats with designs on Baron Montay’s uranium. That's right, uranium—the MacGuffin of Hitchcock’s thriller Notorious from the previous year!  When things go from bad to worse, will our hero sit down to “the worst last meal I ever ate,” or can he clear himself as he ducks flying bullets and one-liners between make-out sessions with Carlotta? One of Hope's best comedies, MFB deftly spoofs hard-boiled private eye thrillers of the era with a barrage of uproarious quips and set pieces in a private sanatorium and an atmospheric mansion (Ronnie: “Nice cheerful place. What time do they bring the mummies out?”). It’s like The Big Sleep on laughing gas, and makes about the same amount of sense. I’m tempted to quote more of Hope and Lamour’s witty quips, but I’d probably end up typing almost the entire zingy script verbatim. 

Is Carlotta giving Ronnie a private screening?

Hope and Lamour's usual comic/romantic chemistry is at its finest. I especially enjoyed the fact that more often than not, Carlotta was able to think on her feet and get the bumbling Ronnie out of one jam after another while he either went to pieces or let his little bouts of success go to his head. You go, girl!  The nifty supporting cast includes Peter Lorre as a knife-throwing henchman and assassin studying to pass his U.S. citizenship exam (he makes the phrase “What does the executive branch of our government do? It carries OUT the laws!” sound sinister and hilarious at the same time); the unfairly uncredited Jean Wong, endearing as Mrs. Fong, mother of a tot so loathe to smile that Ronnie quips, "This kid's gonna grow up to be a sponsor!"; Lon Chaney Jr., essentially playing his classic and oft-imitated Of Mice and Men role for laughs; Jack La Rue, the lone American in 1948’s Brits-trying-to-sound-like-New-Yorkers adaptation of the notorious oddball crime drama No Orchids for Miss Blandish; and a couple of delightful star cameos sure to bring a smile to any classic movie fan’s face, especially the Paramount tough guy who plays Sam McCloud! The movie is a delight, but the DVD print, not so much, alas, despite a handful of nice interactive features. 

Whatever
Carlotta wants,
Carlotta gets!

Somewhere along the way, MFB slipped out of Paramount Pictures’ hands and wound up in Public Domain Hell!  The Madacy DVD currently available doesn't have the most pristine print; it’s got more scratches than a nudist who stumbled into poison ivy. Nevertheless, my scratchy copy of MFB is still a far better copy than the one that Turner Classic Movies periodically runs!  Heck, the TCM print is actually missing a few minutes in the scene taking place just after the rained-upon Ronnie and Carlotta return to McCloud’s office. I noticed the Columbia Pictures Television logo at the end of TCM’s recent MFB broadcast. Should we be pestering and persuading Columbia Pictures using every known form of communication in order to get a gorgeous print of MFB available to the world again? Please, motion picture historians and fellow film fanatics, let’s find a way to give this cheeky, cheerful farce a restoration and the Criterion-caliber treatment it deserves!

Guess  Mrs. Fong's baby isn't a vegetarian!

Update for 2011: My husband Vinnie gave me The Shout! Factory's deluxe Bob Hope DVD set, including a gorgeously remastered version of My Favorite Brunette! Many thanks to fellow Peter Lorre/Bob Hope fan Cheryl Morris for bringing the set to my attention!