Yes Sir, That's My Baby

As usual, Charles Coburn-or "Piggy", as he's lovingly referred to in my house-is the most adorable part of the movie. He just has one of those faces, and one of those voices; he improves the scenes he's in, no matter how bad the rest of the movie is. In Yes Sir, That's My Baby, it's a slapstick battle of the sexes between Donald O'Connor and the rest of his college's football team versus their wives. The wives, also in college, unite because of their professor's feminist lectures, and forbid their husbands from being on the football team. The husbands, bolstered by their professor's manly lectures, maintain they can't be kept away from their greatest passion. It turns out the only reason the feud exists is because the professors, Charles Coburn and Barbara Brown, used to be engaged and now hate each other!

So, when Piggy is making the audience laugh with jokes about how important it is to be the man of the house while simultaneously falling to pieces at the sight of a newborn baby, the movie is pretty cute. And to be honest, the first few times the husbands boast about their babies' accomplishments like wives usually do-Donald O'Connor says his son was born with a tooth-and struggle with the laundry and walk down the street with a pack of strollers are funny. There are definitely some sequences that get too silly, or too dated, for this movie to be a treasure I'll want to watch over and over again. Overall, it was enjoyable, especially when compared to some really stinky battle-of-the-sexes movies from that era, but mostly because of Charles Coburn's class and comedic timing. Donald O'Connor gets to show off his dancing skills with a memorable routine in the laundromat. With all those backflips and acrobatic moves, it's no wonder he was cast to play Buster Keaton in the following decade!

For several months, I've favorited a lot of Donald O'Connor movies on YouTube that, as far as I know, aren't available on either old VHS tapes or on current DVD's. Now I finally took the time to watch one of them. In this one, Donald is one of several former G.I.s now in college-who are also new dads-who's also on the football team...well, he would be if his wife Gloria DeHaven, also a student, would let him. It seems his coach played by Charles Coburn, who also teaches biology there, had once a relationship with the female instructor of Ms. DeHaven, Barbara Brown, that didn't end well. Their animosity is what has caused the wives of the other former G.I.s to also put their foot down, so to speak. But you know where there's a will there's a way...Plenty of funny stuff concerning babies and other domestic mishaps occur but of course with both O'Connor and DeHaven on board there's also singing and dancing. Donald, in fact, has a fine tap dancing number at the laundromat. By the way, the reason that I watched this now is because since I'm reviewing members of the original "Dallas" cast in previous movies and TV shows in chronological order, this was next on the list since Jim "Jock Ewing" Davis is among the G.I. football players. So on that note, Yes Sir, That's My Baby gets a recommendation.

Right now, you can watch this on YouTube.

While I'm usually an avid fan of Charles Coburn (The More the Merrier, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes), his appearance here could have been replaced by an entirely different type without any loss.

About 34 minutes in, O'Connor does a very good dance, showcasing his grace and athleticism, and making interesting use of his non-dancing male extras.

I'd probably buy this title just for those 4-5 minutes. Universal needs to publish O'Connor's movies on DVD, or at least create a compilation of his musical numbers.