Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? June 23, 2007
Posted by clydefro in : Classic Films, 1950s , trackback
American film comedy took a creative hit in the 1950s. Absent are the screwball antics and the witty sophistication from the previous two decades of talking pictures. To be fair, World War II and its aftermath would be reason enough to sober up a nation full of writers, filmmakers, and audiences. Yet, it’s fairly difficult to find screen comedy in post-war Hollywood on the level of what we saw from directors like Preston Sturges, Howard Hawks, Frank Capra, Ernst Lubitsch, even Mitchell Leisen under the studio system. If you look at the AFI’s 100 Years…100 Laughs list from 2000, a flawed but probably unmatched indicator for judging trends in the comedy canon, you’ll find that a whopping 31 films were released between the beginning of the 1930s and 1945. It’s certainly impressive that a fifteen year period accounted for almost a third of a list compiled over six decades after most of the films were released.
By comparison, the period between 1945 and 1959, when Billy Wilder’s Some Like It Hot, the AFI’s choice for #1, was released, arguably reigniting the American comedy, yielded only 11 selections on the list. Additionally, the films included in that span seem lightweight and stale in comparison. Where we had the likes of Chaplin, the Marx Brothers, Cary Grant, and four Sturges films earlier, now we’re looking at Father of the Bride, The Seven Year Itch, Auntie Mame and The Court Jester, films that perhaps haven’t aged quite so well. Notwithstanding Some Like It Hot, by far the most accomplished (and funniest) film from this later era on the list is Singin’ in the Rain, usually not even considered a comedy so much as a musical (though, admittedly, that may be a point of contention).
Even sticking with the AFI list, though, makes it difficult to find any real rhyme or reason in those selected films from ‘45 to ‘59. There are movie stars - Spencer Tracy and Marilyn Monroe each pop up twice, while Cary Grant and James Stewart are in one apiece - and well-known directors - two from Billy Wilder, as well as two written by Garson Kanin and directed by George Cukor. But there really aren’t any dominant figures, actor, writer or director, among these eleven films like we’d seen in the decade and a half earlier. The strange thing about the list is that there actually was someone who was doing exciting, interesting things in live-action American film comedy, yet Frank Tashlin and his films were ignored by the AFI’s listmakers. I’m not arguing he should have had four or five movies in the top 100, but some recognition would have been nice.
Like other creative forces of comedy, Tashlin had his hand in the writing of many of his films. Though several of these were based on other writers’ stories, the director seems to have molded the screen versions largely himself, including the two films he made with Jayne Mansfield at Twentieth Century-Fox. The first of these was The Girl Can’t Help It, a starmaking vehicle for Mansfield. It’s now frequently cited as the first significant “rock ‘n roll film” and featured musical performances by Little Richard and Fats Domino, among others. It’s a fun movie, cinematic bubblegum. I might have enjoyed it more without Tom Ewell and Edmond O’Brien, as the latter seemed to like playing his role more than I enjoyed watching him do so. The songs can also be a little repetitive and annoying, but lots of people might disagree with me there.
With the success of The Girl Can’t Help It, director and leading lady quickly re-teamed for Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, the Broadway version of which (mostly abandoned by Tashlin’s screenplay) Mansfield had been starring in just before she made her initial film with Tashlin. I’ve noticed mixed opinions as to which film is better, funnier, sharper, etc. I’ll take the second pairing in all those criteria without hesitation. Aside from a better cast around Mansfield, especially Tony Randall in the title role, the follow-up film seems much more pointed and enjoyable. Tashlin’s trademark bright hues, even painting the screen with full color fades at times, are on display, but slightly reined in. Characters still tend to wear glossy outfits (why have a drab earthtone robe when a shiny red one works just fine), though the level of seizure-inducing, eye-popping visuals is a little less distracting this time around.
We also have little jokes flying throughout the picture, beginning with Randall playing the 20th Century-Fox theme music by himself on multiple instruments. The actor then searches his pockets for the name of the film, mistakenly referring to it as The Girl Can’t Help It, before we see several fake advertisements as the opening credits roll. They’re both ridiculous and humorous while having little to do with the film’s storyline aside from the Madison Avenue backdrop. At first glance, the use of false ads may seem dated, and there was definitely a strange fascination with the advertising world in several films from this era, but it’s not too difficult to see a strand running between some of the seemingly over-the-top things we see here and the even less sensical attempts to sell us things today. The same “how did we ever get by without this product” mentality is inherently present just as much today as it was then and vice versa. (An upsetting trend towards the emotional dilution of rock music via ads hocking everything from automobiles to investment firms adds an odd twist given the subjects of the two Tashlin-Mansfield films.)
Television itself also briefly becomes the butt of one of the more clever gags in Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?. Randall, once again out of character as in the opening, interrupts the film to remind us how commercials disrupt television programs. We then see the screen shrink (made more noticeable by the CinemaScope format that surely lost much of its impact when seen only on broadcast television in the decades since the theatrical release, as well as a pan and scan VHS edition) and switch to black and white. It’s a little bit of propaganda in the fight for viewers between the small screen and the expanding silver one, but I still think it’s inventive fun. Tashlin is making clear that his film is more than a sitcom on a big canvas, pulling out tricks where he can. (Meanwhile I can’t help but wonder how American comedy has been dragged down to the succession of bodily function jokes gutter it’s been stuck in for years now, a lowest common [PG-13] denominator discouragingly populated by the new directorial titans of box office yuks Tom Shadyac, Shawn Levy, and the Farrellys.)
Through three separate stints working for Warner Bros. on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies animated shorts, Tashlin was able to hone his ribald comic sensibility while crafting characters like Porky Pig and, later, Private Snafu, star of a military-only series of which Tashlin directed four shorts. It’s fitting, then, that the director’s feature films are so often described as being like live-action Looney Tunes, because, at their best, they basically are. Vibrant colors, crazy sight gags, and larger than life, exaggerated characters are consistent in the animated shorts just as in Tashlin’s films, with the humor aimed more at adults than children. And just as Tashlin had Porky Pig and Daffy Duck in his cartoons, he had Jerry Lewis and Jayne Mansfield in his features. While Lewis would prove to be a more frequent collaborator, with Tashlin directing two of the comic’s teamings with Dean Martin and six of his solo starring pictures, it was Mansfield who became perhaps the closest thing Hollywood has ever had to a living, breathing cartoon movie star.
Fearless and intelligent, the woman used by her movie studio as a threat to Marilyn Monroe would end up with a similarly tragic fate. Mansfield, however, had a much shorter time in the spotlight and Tashlin seemed to be the only director who knew what to do with such a unique screen presence. Her iconic figure, shrill voice, platinum hair, and painted face are all used at the actress’s expense, the punchline instead of the joke teller. Like the animated bombshells she resembled, Mansfield has minimal smoldering chemistry or sex appeal in the Tashlin films and the director never seems very interested in her sensuality. Mansfield plays Rita Marlowe with ease, and any other actress, even Marilyn, would be unimaginable in the role. The problem is that these types of roles become one-dimensional when repeated with lesser directors and an actress/sex bomb with Jayne Mansfield’s appearance and reputation wasn’t going to get the in-demand serious roles. It’s difficult not to feel a little sorry for her, especially considering how bubbly the Tashlin films can be, given the almost inevitable direction her career would take.
In contrast to the enduringly popular Mansfield, the real lead of Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? is Tony Randall, despite the film only being available on R1 DVD in Fox’s Jayne Mansfield Collection (a fine 2.35:1 anamorphic transfer with original four channel audio). His name comes after hers in the credits and the blonde starlet dominates the DVD cover, wearing a bedsheet and a martini, while Randall is relegated to a small photo alongside an oft-dyed poodle, Mickey Hargitay sporting a chest hairpiece and a second picture of Mansfield. At least Rock Hunter got his name in the US title. Internationally, it was released in the UK as Oh! For a Man! and known as La Blonde explosive in France. Nevertheless, Randall stands out as the great “Lover Doll,” whether he’s hiding from his adoring public behind a Rita Marlowe advertisement or basking in the glow of the executive washroom. Mansfield has kept the film moderately well-known for fifty years, but it’s Randall who’s responsible for most of the laughs on screen.
While too much analysis can take the fun out of comedy, it’s also nice to think a little as you laugh. Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? appeals to my sense of humor and Frank Tashlin’s clever, though not entirely subtle, film works on several levels. Great comedy does that because it takes into consideration the many different things people find funny. For instance, I can’t help but laugh when I see the Russian newspaper taking credit for Lover Doll and adding a moustache in the process. I also think it’s funny to catch the numerous references to other Fox films. A mention of The Girl Can’t Help It or Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing alone might seem shameless or distasteful, but the overkill of adding Peyton Place, Love Me Tender, and two other Mansfield films transforms the gag into a recurring wink that makes me smile. Tashlin’s approach may seem like he’s going for broke at every opportunity, but I’d argue that such a gifted and experienced comedy talent (his entire professional life was devoted to the genre) knew exactly when to show restraint and when to give the audience the whiz-bang farcical treatment.
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