Once Upon a Honeymoon

I have to agree with the other comment! I had no clue what the whole short was about. I thought that Mary just had an unnatural obsession with the telephone. I had no idea that it was a Bell Telephone commercial. And the whole idea with Sonya and Gordon just made the short even dumber. But, the beginning of the short where you have all the angels up on "Cloud Seven" just adds insult to injury. The short by itself is awful which is why I only gave it a 1. However, with the MST3K team adding commentary and humor to it, it's definitely a 10! Hopefully anyone else who reads this comment will find it helpful! And I really wish that MST3K would come back!

Yes, the lady of the house is obsessed with co-ordinating telephones for every room so this must be a commercial in disguise! Directed by Gower Champion (he of the dancing duo) it really is an odd entry into musical shorts. Virginia Gibson (Mary) sings and dances a bit while husband Ward Ellis (Jeff) has to write one final song before they go on honeymoon.

Of course the inspiration for the song is ... the telephone and the rotary dial! Rather naff and cute and extremely kitsch, this short also has a camp angel called Wilbur who doesn't seem to do a great deal expect perch on the roof and throw down some fairy dust ...

A Fifties couple (choreographer Ward Ellis and dancer Virginia Gibson as songsmith Jeff and his wife Mary) are on their way out the door for their honeymoon, delayed one year already, when the show's producer Gordon (long-time character actor Alan Mowbray) calls up with bad news - their show's diva Sonya doesn't like the tune to a big number, and demands an immediate rewrite! Jeff, predictably, suffers from writer's block being asked to produce a new tune on demand - so supernaturally adorable Mary goes into the ::shudder:: outdated kitchen and begins singing about the modern kitchen she wishes she had, complete with telephone -

Speaking of "supernatural", there's an Angel on their roof, Wilbur, who looks and acts like Charles Nelson Reilly playing Sammy Glick, but who is actually longtime B-movie star Chick Chandler. He's been sent to expedite Jeff's and Mary's honeymoon - good thing he has an eight- ball of coke (er, "bag of magic dust") handy, hmmm?

This bit of charming/mindroasting whimsy/insanity was intended to market Bell Telephone's new color-coordinated phones, which could match the decor of any room and came in a variety of shapes as well, but that particular selling point is buried in a supernatural musical comedy one-act that looks like a demented precursor to THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW. Directed by legendary dance choreographer/director Gower Champion, it's remarkably well done, the script has genuine bits of wit to it, the music is superior to its purpose as a marketing tool, the cast is top-notch and game - and as Tom Servo wondered when it aired on MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000, "What the Hell was that about, anyway?"

Watched on its own its charms this short might not be appreciated, but watched with Mike and the 'Bots, it's a classic of WTF?ery for me. Watch it yourself, and see how you feel....

The credits that I can see while watching this as part of a Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode don't say so, but this must have been sponsored by Western Electric as a soft-sell for their telephones.

Our first clue is that the angels use modified telephone installer handsets - the kind with the dial on the back. Our next clue is how the phone is the cap of every room's imaginary redesign. Finally, it is the phone that gives the composer the idea for the song that springs the couple on to their honeymoon.

Common element: telephones.

There are similar short films extolling electricity, gas, cars, and, uh, cars (lots of cars). This one is tastefully done and doesn't quite hit you over the head with "phones come in colors now so order one today!" sensibility.

Writing music for a television show ought to be a glamorous profession but it seems the songmeisters of yesterday's TV variety shows lived in modest houses with outdated furnishings and crappy appliances. Jeff is one such unlucky composer, but he's in a good mood. He and his wife, Mary, are about to set off on a long-delayed honeymoon. That is, until the phone rings. It seems the diva slated to appear on the show wants a new song and wants it now. No honeymoon until new song is in the can! What's a young musician to do? In the face of this bad news, Jeff is up to smoking the better part of a carton of cigarettes but not much more. Luckily, Jeff's flamboyant guardian angel is loitering on the roof with a bag of nose candy, and Mary's got a fixation with telephones...

Phones, and their place in the interior design of the 50's, are about as close as this short comes to having a point. While Jeff struggles with his new assignment, Mary wanders about the house, wishing for updates to her decor. Every upgrade includes a new phone, although I suspect a phone in the bathroom would be a little weird.

This short is good, if pointless, fun. The songs are catchy, and Mary is quite fetching when she's done up in her evening wear. There's no reason given for why Jeff and Mary went a whole year with no honeymoon. However, given that one of the lines in Mary's wishing song is, "I wish that refrigerator door would close and stay closed," maybe they were waiting for a time when neither of them was down with salmonella.

The MST3k gang give Once Upon a Honeymoon a good working over. This was the short that taught me never to drink water while watching MST3k.