12/24/2023 0 Comments The man who knew too little disc![]() Far from being a fast-tracked cash in, Nat Perrin’s screenplay elaborates upon the characters’ personalities and situations, setting up some expanded action comedy sequences and, in its tale of the duo solving another crime, this time in the Deep South, builds on what came before instead of simply repeating it. Such was the popularity of Skelton’s Whistling debut that a second film, Whistling In Dixie (1942, 74 mins) was rushed into production almost immediately, released to theaters just one year later. Having now seen the source of many of the references in that film (most notably the central “1930s radio star crime solving couple finding themselves embroiled in a real murder on the eve of their wedding” plot), I will forever see Wilder’s version in an entirely new light. At times Skelton reminded me of Bill Murray’s mistaken identity character in the underrated The Man Who Knew Too Little, though the films also clearly left their marks on the makers of Haunted Honeymoon, both the original 1940s murder mystery and the 1980s jokey remake with Gene Wilder. Whistling In The Dark is a pretty good example of the genre at this time, alongside such films as other “old dark house” spoofs featuring Bob Hope and the like (Skelton’s hapless “in trouble” expression often resembles Hope’s, too). He’s helped immensely by Skelton, who is a natural comic presence with the spitfire dialogue, but also able to handle the more dramatic aspects of the script too, especially in the genuinely exciting final scenes. Sylvan Simon (a collectible name for those into alliteration, and no relation to this reviewer!), a stage and screen helmer who was a solid handler of comedy sequences on other films (including the Marx Brothers’ The Big Store) and would go on to direct all three Whistling pictures, opens up the action and, despite the limited locations, leans it away from any staginess that often hampered these kinds of translations. In the role of Wally “the Fox” Benton, a writer-actor of the kind of hugely successful murder mysteries that kept audiences glued to their radios at the time, the first of the series, Whistling In The Dark (1941, 78 mins) finds Wally’s “perfect crime” abilities under demand from a crooked cult leader, the wonderful Conrad Veidt (later to create the role of Jaffar in Korda’s The Thief Of Bagdad), to create the perfect murder in return for the freedom of his also kidnapped girlfriend, Carol Lambert (Ann Rutherford, who had previously played a similar role opposite Mickey Rooney in his Andy Hardy series) and his radio sponsor’s daughter.Īs with many films of the era, Whistling In The Dark was based on a Broadway play, a popular source of material for many such films, but director S. MGM were quick to promote him to star status, and the plots of the Whistling films allowed for a playful crossover of his radio and film careers. Just a year later, he was on the screen too, by way of supporting roles in a couple of RKO and Warners Vitaphone projects, before earning a contract playing light relief in MGM’s original Doctor Kildare pictures of the early 1940s. ![]() Discovered as a teenager by none other than Ed Wynn, Skelton learned his profession in the days of vaudeville and various travelling shows and circuses, becoming enough of a name by 1937 to warrant guest spots on radio, where he was quickly contracted as a regular. Indeed, although I of course recognize the name and face, the only tenuously linked exposure you could say I have ever had to him was via Tex Avery’s classic 1943 pastiche of the murder mystery picture Who Killed Who?, in which a parading line of skeletons tumbling out from a closet stop mid-air so that one – naturally crimson in color – can make the dreadfully bad pun, “haha… RED Skeleton!”Īudiences at the time would have rolled over at the joke: by 1943, the third of Skelton’s Whistling trilogy had hit the screens and he had become Hollywood’s latest comic star, and in particular the center of that series of that popular genre, the comedy-thriller. I have to admit that, for all my appreciation for classic cinema, the comedic exploits of Red Skelton have continuously passed me by for one reason or another. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/Warner Home Video (1941-43 / 2010), 3 discs, 239 mins, 1.33:1,ĭolby Mono, Not Rated, $24.95 (available online only from the Warner Archive Collection)
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