Swingin' Along

Only good thing was Mr. Ray Charles, Mr. Williams, and Bobby.

The careers of Peter Marshall and Tommy Noonan, successful as singles never quite made it as a comedy team as demonstrated by Swinging Along.

In this Marshall is a grifter who owes some big bucks to bookie Mike Mazurki and needs a place to lie low. Along comes Tommy who is a Jerry Lewis like schlepp who lives with Aunt Connie Gilchrist. A game of billiards brings these two together.

Noonan was good at both comedy and drama and sadly died young. Marshall became known as the host of Hollywood Squares. Barbara Eden is here as the love interest.

As a tram, just not meant to be.

At first apprehensive, given how old-fashioned this comedy was, I gradually got into it and discovered the minor charms of a genuine, sincere "family" film of its era. I'm glad to have stuck with it, as growing up I was a fan of Ray Charles and Bobby Vee -I even had the "Bobby Vee Meet the Ventures" early in my collection.

With Peter Marshall doing the Bud Abbott style quasi-straight man and Noonan as the clearly Jerry Lewis-aimed lovable dimwit, the movie is hard to watch early on, but picks up as the sentimentality, delivered by director of so many successful film for children (and family audiences) Charles Barton, has its quaint charm. The tired gags are performed earnestly and even a throwback to Silent Comedy (most specifically Harold Lloyd) is staged rather elaborately in the chase after the wind-propelled sheet music, with a building looking suspiciously like the Flatiron Building dominating the frame, though set in Frisco instead of Manhattan.

A major pleasure for me was to see Barbara Eden, so early in her career (shot in 1960) styled with the sophistication of a Hitchcock heroine of the '50s/'60s, like Eva Marie Saint. In this period I thought of her as a sex symbol, based on her very hot performance in the otherwise G-rated "Seven Faces of Dr. Lao" which I caught back then on a matinee.

The fact that 20th Century-Fox produced this extremely minor movie on an expansive level, in Cineamascope and color (Eastman) yet, really impressed me; back at the time I saw many a Fox 'Scope release but they were usually in black & white as B movies (e.g., sci-fi and horror such as "Space Master X-7".

As a fan of comedy teams, I have wanted to view this film for years. What a disappointment. Tommy Noonan and Peter Marshall have to be the most lackluster comedy team ever. Noonan had a successful career as a character actor ("A Star Is Born", "Bundle of Joy", "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes"), while Marshall's fame rests on his work as a TV game show host ("Hollywood Squares"). In this film, they do one marginal routine together, a pool game routine. It is marginally amusing. The rest of the film deals with con-man Marshall's attempts to get procrastinating composer Noonan to finish writing a song for a competition. The chemistry is really missing between these two guys. They are less a comedy team and more like two actors who happen to be paired in a film. There is a little slapstick, but it is very mild. There are musical numbers, but none are performed by Noonan and Marshall, both who have musical comedy backgrounds. Guest stars Ray Charles, Bobby Vee, and Roger Williams handle the musical end. I have been told that of the two Noonan and Marshall starring features, this is the better one. I have never seen "The Rookie", but it must really be terrible. "Swingin Along" is not unwatchable; it is merely mild, and a bit boring. As a side note, Alan Carney, of the defunct comedy team of Brown and Carney, has a small cameo in this film.

Tommy Noonan is a would-be composer, who gets hooked up with Peter Marshall, when Marshall wants to get romantic with Noonan's psychiatrist, Barbara Eden. There's a contest that Noonan wants to win, so Marshall noodges him for 25%.

There's something flat and uninspired about the classic gags that the two of them execute, and the best part of the movie are the musical interludes -- including Ray Charles doing "What I Say?" -- but Marshall seems to vanish towards the end.

I guess he got tired. Noonan was John Ireland's half-brother, and his then-sister-in-law Joan Dru introduced him to her brother, actor-singer Peter Marshall. The team had Noonan as the nebbishy zany, with Marshall as his straight man. Although they had a good deal of success in live shows and on TV, their attempt to be the new Martin & Lewis failed, and they went their own ways.

Noonan was a fair actor, with a couple of good roles, most particularly as "Danny Maguire" in the Judy Garland version of A STAR IS BORN. That apparent talent isn't on display here. He died in 1968, only 46 years old.