THE PAJAMA GAME

John Raitt and Doris Day

THE PAJAMA GAME (1957). Directed by George Abbott and Stanley Donen. 

Sid Sorokin (John  Raitt) gets a job in management at a pajama factory and almost immediately comes into romantic conflict with worker and union member Babe Williams (Doris Day). Although the two are clearly attracted to one another, Babe is sure that there will eventually be problems over their taking opposite sides in a struggle over a raise of seven and a half cents. Meanwhile Gladys (Carol Haney), who keeps the books, is exasperated by her boyfriend Vernon's (Eddie Foy Jr. of The Case of the Black Parrot) almost pathological jealousy. When the workers decide to have a slow-down on the job, things come to a head.  

Picture This: Foy and Shaw trip the Light Fantastic

The Pajama Game is based on the Broadway show with songs by Adler and Ross and choreography by Bob Fosse, which is transplanted to the screen along with much of the cast, such as Raitt. Doris Day replaced Janis Paige, but she is quite good, and handsome Raitt is so good -- and has such an outstanding voice -- that it's a wonder he didn't have more film assignments. Haney and Foy are also excellent, as is Reta Shaw, who does a delightful light-on-her-feet number with Foy ("Picture This"). Other musical highlights include Raitt singing the show's most memorable number, "Hey There;" the big production number at the picnic ("Once a Year Day"); and the smoky, insinuating "Hernando's Hideaway." Another well-known number from the show is "Steam Heat," which I confess I've never much cared for. 

John Raitt 

Thelma Pelish makes an impression as Mae, the economy-sized factory worker and wit who certainly stands out in (very) widescreen. Barbara Nichols [Woman Obsessed] as dumb Poopsie is her typical whiny self and even attempts to sing at times. The worst performance is from Ralph Dunn (of The Golden Eye) as boss Myron Hasler, who instead of  being amusing is merely loud and obnoxious, ruining virtually every scene that he's in. It also has to be noted that the secondary love story between Gladys and Vernon has its tiresome moments, especially the nonsense with the latter throwing knives at everyone in the office. Otherwise, Pajama Game is a likable, entertaining, if relatively slight musical comedy with several good scenes and songs. 

Verdict: Fun and tuneful musical with a spirited Day and a rather sexy Raitt. ***. 

MAN AFRAID

George Nader

MAN AFRAID (1957). Director: Harry Keller.

A man sneaks into a child's bedroom window and runs into the boy's mother, hitting her in the face and temporarily blinding her. When her husband, minister David Collins (George Nader), comes to her rescue he winds up inadvertently killing the intruder. Although not charged with any crime, Collins learns that the dead man's father, Carl Simmons (Eduard Franz), is following his little boy, Michael (Tim Hovey), around town in a threatening manner. Collins' wife, Lisa (Phyllis Thaxter), feels helpless because her eyes are bandaged. As Simmons becomes more and more bold, going so far as to invade Collins' very home, the minister tries to get Lt Marlin (Harold J. Stone) to take some kind of preventative action. But will it all come too late?

Nader with feisty Mabel Albertson

Man Afraid is a solid suspense film with very good performances. Nader has always been under-rated because of his participation in such films as Robot Monster, but he's fine in this, as are Thaxter and little Tim Hovey, an appealing and talented child actor. Reta Shaw offers a little spice as a nurse hired to look after Lisa, and Mabel Albertson certainly makes her mark as Simmons' tippling and fairly obnoxious landlady. Stone also makes the policeman more obnoxious than he needs to be. Tom Nolan is also notable as Michael's friend, "Skunky," who is neglected by his father (Judson Pratt), an aggressive newsman. He tells the sympathetic Collins that his father claims he makes too much noise "but when I'm dead they'll wish I was able to make any kind of noise." Franz is effective in a near-silent role.

Nader with Phyllis Thaxter

Man Afraid is well-photographed in CinemaScope by Russell Metty, and has a very good score by Henry Mancini. Keller's direction is adroit, and the climax is tense and exciting. One odd sequence concerns a boxing match between little boys in an actual arena, a match that Michael participates in! Considering that the "burglar" entered the Collins' house when the couple was home, and immediately snuck into the boy's bedroom, one has to wonder exactly what the man was after, but this aspect goes unexplored. Harry Keller also directed Nader in The Female Animal and The Unguarded Moment. 

Verdict: Absorbing suspense film with good performances and a satisfying conclusion. ***. 

THE CREEPER -- "ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS" CLASSIC EPISODE

Hitch

"The Creeper." Alfred Hitchcock Presents, 1956. Season 1, episode 38. Written by James B. Cavanagh from the story by Joseph Ruscoll. Directed by Herschel Daugherty.

Ellen Grant (Constance Ford of Claudelle Inglish) a housewife married to the loving if grumpy, Steve (Steve Brodie), is constantly on edge because two women -- also blonds, also left alone at night when their husbands are working -- have been murdered by an unknown maniac known as the "Creeper." Ellen is suspicious of everyone: her old boyfriend, Ed (Harry Townes), who comes to keep an eye on her but reveals that he's carried a grudge since she left him; the weaselly, always-smiling new super, George (Percy Helton); the old shoemaker (Alfred Linder) down the block who wants her address; even her neighbor, Martha (Reta Shaw), who says "decent women don't get themselves murdered" and thinks Ellen is carrying on with Ed. The episode builds suspense with each character who appears, all of whom are expertly portrayed by the excellent cast. 

Constance Ford

Topping the cast list, of course, is Constance Ford, one of the very best actresses of the period who appeared in a great many shows and movies but never quite made it to the front rank of stardom but deserved to. She gives a very strong and sympathetic performance in this, and the episode -- while chilling -- is ultimately heartbreaking. I have never forgotten Ford's sad, life-weary, regretful and horrified final words. The poignancy of the ending isn't even washed away by Hitchcock's flippant closing remarks, which are somewhat at odds with the tone of the story. While one can't quite call "The Creeper" any kind of feminist tract, it does illustrate how women can be horribly mistreated by others even when they aren't being murdered.

Verdict: A strong episode of an excellent program. ***. 

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. Season 3

Reta Shaw as a sinister THRUSH agent

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. Season Three.  1966.

Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn) and Illya Kurakin (David McCallum), as well as Mr. Waverly (Leo G. Carroll), are back for a third season of Uncle. Fans of the show generally consider this the worst of the four seasons, as there were times the program began to resemble an out and out comedy a la Get Smart. In spite of this, some of the more absurd episodes were fun. The first two episodes concerned homicidal females: "Her Master's Voice" had the mesmerized staff at a girls' school taking after the agents; and the memorably batty "The Sort of Do-It-Yourself Dreadful Affair" featured killer robots modeled on beautiful women. The entertaining two-part "Concrete Overcoat Affair" was turned into the theatrical feature The Spy with the Green Hat. A silly but zesty episode had the wonderful Reta Shaw [Sanctuary] as a THRUSH operative trying to find a scientist (Victor Borge) with a dangerous formula in his head in "The Suburbia Affair." A ray that could put people into instant suspended animation figured in "Deadly Smorgasbord." "Off-Broadway Affair" starred Shari Lewis in a tale of THRUSH using a theater to gain access to computer info. At least two of the season's episodes were not campy. "Galatea Affair" starred Joan Collins [Tales that Witness Madness] as a woman trained to take the place of a lookalike, a baroness working for you-know-who. "The Candidate's Wife" also featured a double substituted for the wife (Diana Hyland of Jigsaw) of a presidential nominee. Understandably, these were two of the season's best episodes.

Fans generally consider the worst episode to be "The Super Colossal Affair" in which the mob drops a bomb on Los Angeles which turns out to be -- unfortunately for poor Illya -- a ten ton stink bomb! Okay, this is a far cry from what the fans were hoping for, but I have to say this episode is absolutely hilarious, which was generally not true for many of its campy, would-be comical episodes -- yes, "Super Colossal" was not the worst episode of season three. J. Carrol Naish is very funny in this story as well.

Verdict: A comedown from seasons one and two, but still entertaining. **1/2.

SANCTUARY

SANCTUARY (1961). Director: Tony Richardson.

A housekeeper named Nancy (Odetta) is sentenced to hang because she murdered an infant, but strangely the baby's mother, Temple (Lee Remick), wants to save the murderess' life. To that end she tells her father, Governor Drake (Howard St. John) what transpired during some very dark days in her past. In this second film version of William Faulkner's "Sanctuary" after The Story of Temple Drake [with parts of Faulkner's sequel, "Requiem for a Nun" thrown into the mix], Temple again winds up at a bootlegger's hide-out, is raped by "Candy Man" (Yves Montand) and taken to a whorehouse, but eventually winds up married to straight arrow Gowan Stevens (Bradford Dillman), whereupon she hires old associate Nancy to look after her children. Sanctuary idiotically tries to convince the viewer that somehow her infant's murder is all her fault, which is so morally moronic it isn't funny. And that isn't the only problem with the movie. Montand is screamingly miscast as the rapist ["Wanna dwink?" he asks Dillman in one hilarious scene], and although Remick has given some nice performances elsewhere, she is defeated by the sheer stupidity of James Poe's screenplay. Ironically Sanctuary emerges as more dated than The Story of Temple Drake because in this version Temple falls in love with her rapist, an odious notion that even soap operas finally began to reject in recent years. [Yes, one could argue that it's really sexual obsession, and Temple is not normal, but it's still offensive.] Dillman gives one of his "I'm not really sure what I'm doing here" performances; Harry Townes is notable as Nancy's lawyer, Ira; and Reta Shaw is fun as the painted madame of a brothel. Folksinger Odetta isn't a seasoned enough actress to make much of an impression as Nancy, but her part is so unbelievable it would tax the talents of an experienced acting genius. This very stupid movie seems to forget that there is never any justification for taking the life of an innocent child. The phony quasi-religious ending may have you screaming at the TV. In black and white CinemaScope.

Verdict: Looks like "fun," but isn't. *1/2.

BETTY WHITE IN BLACK AND WHITE

BETTY WHITE IN BLACK AND WHITE DVD collection.

If you can't get enough of Betty White, here's a DVD collection of some of her shows from the fifties. There are two episodes of Life with Elizabeth that she did with Del Moore [three sketches per episode] in which they play a married couple. The skits range in quality from amusing to tiresome but all are well-acted. Betty reveals a very pleasant singing voice on an episode of the daytime variety show The Betty White Show. Betty surprises a young orphan (also named Betty) with a ton of gifts but it's hard to tell if the strangely subdued child is shell-shocked or annoyed that she didn't get the gift she wanted! Then there are two episodes of the sitcom A Date with the Angels in which Betty and Bill Williams play another married couple. On one episode stately Nancy Kulp [Miss Jane Hathaway of The Beverly Hillbillies] plays a highly sophisticated wife of a friend. Judging by these episodes, A Date with the Angels was pleasant but forgettable. Lastly, there's two episodes of yet another program called The Betty White Show [this one aired in the evening] which also has comedy sketches featuring Jimmy Boyd and the wonderful Reta Shaw. I have to confess I didn't like the Olga cleaning woman sketch any better than I did Carol Burnett's later charwoman routine. All in all, this is an interesting collection, however. White exhibited a bundle of comedic talent practically from the first.

Verdict: If you're not into the "fabulous fifties," there's always White in The Golden Girls. **1/2.