The Day the Bookies Wept

Joe Penner is primarily remembered for the catchphrase "Wanna buy a duck?" and for the vocal imitation that Looney Tunes' Egghead did of him -- the character later evolved into Elmer Fudd. Briefly a leading movie comedian, Penner made perhaps half a dozen movies and then.... well, I suppose he's dead by now. After spending more than an hour listening to his voice, I certainly hope so.

This movie, however, is a decent little affair, thanks to some beautiful comedy construction by the screenwriters, including George Jeske, and director Leslie Goodwins, who fill the movie with plenty of good gags, a nice comic turn by Thurston Hall as a con man, Betty Grable getting her break as the love interest and some good supporting comic turns, like Tom Kennedy.

This movie is by no means a great one, but a decent example of the sort of decent comedy that can be turned out by talented professionals despite a dud in the leading spot.

Joe Penner was an extremely untalented and physically unappetising man who starred in a few low-budget comedies. Basically, Joe Penner was Lou Costello without the sex appeal. (Or Frankie Howerd with less effeminacy.) If Penner is now remembered at all, it's only because he was the source of a catchphrase that continues to resurface: 'Wanna buy a duck?' This was Joe Penner's most significant contribution to comedy, but even this was only down to a process of elimination.

The Hungarian-born Penner started out in American burlesque as a baggy-pants stooge, but he failed to get any laughs. He developed the gimmick of walking out on stage carrying a random prop, and interrupting the straight man to ask him: 'Wanna buy a (whatever object Penner was carrying)?' Time after time, this business got no laughs. Eventually, Penner came out onstage clutching a wooden hunting decoy, and he asked the straight man: 'Wanna buy a duck?' This got a huge laugh, and a star was born ... very briefly. Penner parlayed that one gag question into a brief career as a radio and film comedian. On the radio, Penner developed one other catchphrase that was briefly popular: 'You nassssssty man!' Penner merits a footnote in animation history, as his vocal schtick was the inspiration for Warner Brothers' early cartoon character Egghead, who eventually evolved into Elmer Fudd

Joe Penner's best film was 'The Boys from Syracuse', in which he played a dual role via trick photography. But the merits of that film are largely due to the Rodgers and Hart score and several other cast members, not Penner.

'The Day the Bookies Wept' (great title, lousy film) is more typical of Penner's output. This story is an attempt at imitating Damon Runyon's distinctive universe of gamblers and wise guys, but it's far below Runyon's standard. A fleet of cab drivers have decided to pool their savings and invest in a racehorse. But the nag they end up with is named Hiccough, out of Bourbon, by Distillery. (That's the funniest gag in the picture.) It turns out that Hiccough always runs dead last, at least when he's sober. Ah, but when Hiccough drinks beer ... he becomes the fastest thing on four legs!

Penner plays a pigeon-breeder who implausibly (and ineptly) gets hired as the horse's trainer. He decides to run Hiccough as a long shot and then get the horse drunk so he'll win at long odds. Movies about animal abuse are very seldom funny. (And I know for a fact that horses will strenuously refuse alcohol.) The best and funniest performance in this film is given by veteran comic actor Tom Kennedy. Thurston Hall is welcome, as a blowhard named Colonel March (no relation to Boris Karloff's one-eyed detective of that name). I'll rate this movie 3 points out of 10, mostly because I'm a sucker for 1930s movies full of character actors with Brooklyn accents.

While I like horse racing and an hour movie is generally harmless the biggest problem with this movie is that it just wasn't very funny. The ensamble chracters didn't have super amazing chemistry everyone's just a little stupid or has a funny voice and thats it.

Which is a real shame because this is a character driven movie where there stupidity in managing a horse is whats supposed to be main comedy and drive it home. Because of that even at a flat 1 hour run time I found myself pretty uninterested. The one reason I thought it could be funny is that the gimmick of the racehorse named Hiccup is he only races good when he's drunk. But this is only revealed in the last 10 minutes for one easy race. Theres a lot of antics that could be done with a drunk horse not even 1 single horse walks into a bar joke to be had what a waste.

A group of cabbie friends decides to buy their own racehorse. They tap pigeon trainer Ernest Ambrose (Joe Penner) to go to Kentucky. He gets quickly targeted by a con man who sells him an alcoholic horse. The horse is a loser until Ernest's crush Ina Firpo (Betty Grable) overhears the secret of the horse from the con man. It runs best on beer.

I don't know Joe Penner but he was apparently a big depression era comedian. I can certainly see the screwball comedy of it all and Penner's vaudevillian skills. He's doing something like Jim Varney's Ernest. There is nothing wrong with that type of comedy but it's not the most refined. The writing is a bit messy but there is inherent comedy in a drunken horse premise.

I've only seen a few of Joe Penner's films. Part of this is because he only made 23 features and short films since he died at age 36. Another reason is that Penner's sort of sort of broad humor hasn't aged well. If you don't believe me, read through Penner's bio on IMDB! They certainly thought the comic's talents were limited...and I have seen the same thing in the films I've seen. If you are familiar with old films, Penner is very similar to Joe Besser and Pinky Lee (especially since both had a strong lisp and sounded like cartoon characters)...one-note comics who made the most of their limited abilities. So, I went into this film with very low expectations...but I was hoping I'd enjoy it.

Penner plays a cab driver who loses his job in the most ridiculous manner I can recall having seen in a movie. Soon he's goes out to buy a race horse and ends up getting taken by a con-man and his daughter...selling him an alcoholic, broken-down horses. Can Penner manage to either get the horse to somehow win or at least get the horse to go to AA meetings?

So is the film any good? Well, it's not...though much of the actual story isn't all that bad. The problem was Penner and his shtick...something that wore very thin very quickly in this story. The rest of the cast are better, but for the life of me, who thought having the gorgeous Betty Grable play Penner's girlfriend!?! Talk about ludicrous casting.