Harvey

I was surprised when I found this television version of "Harvey" on YouTube. Apparently, Hallmark Hall of Fame brought this to TV...which is odd considering how famous the earlier movie version was. Unfortunately, the print online isn't very good and isn't the easiest viewing because of this.

As for this version, it's sadly almost exactly like the 1950 film. Apart from a curse word (which you wouldn't have had in a movie in the 50s), it's the same...with Jimmy Stewart also in the lead as well as Jesse White as the orderly. I can't see how it's an improvement in any way and lacks originality. Also, while Helen Hayes was a wonderful actress, here she isn't as good as Josephine Hull (who received the Oscar for her memorable performance). Only worth seeing if you are very curious--otherwise just stick with the original.

What a perfect casting as Jimmy Stewart knocks the character of Elwood P. Dowd out of the park. He has the childish charm and the utter bewilderment that plays into the being of someone that everyone else thinks is crazy. Rather than viewing him as an idiot, we may actually start seeing that six foot rabbit through his eyes. This is a first rate example of a screwball comedy, but it is more than that because the script is so good (remember that this was a successful stage play before making it to the movies). It has some of the interesting TV actors from 1972, such as Fred Gwynne (Herman Munster) and others like Anne Francis. Nicely done and enjoyable.

Adored the original movie. It is literally one of my favorite movies of all time. Stewart later remark that his character was not assertive enough. PooBa. That self-effacing, nice character of Ellwood in the original movie is what sold it. He was so good and so nice that you had no doubt that Harvey was real. This was a remake that ruined everything. Boo.

Stewart kept returning to Elwood P. Dowd after definitively filming "Harvey," in 1950, and this 1972 Hallmark TV production, taped shortly after a Broadway revival, catches him doing his usual, competent thing, with an attractive cast around him. Minus commercials, it's about an hour fifteen, and that betrays the cuts and revisions that have been made to Mary Chase's script. The romance between Dr. Sanderson (a miscast Richard Mulligan) and Nurse Kelly (Madeline Kahn, about to become prominent thanks to "What's Up, Doc?"), is missing. Dowd's age is moved up to 57 (Stewart was 64 and looks it), and Helen Hayes is OK as Veda, though not a patch on Josephine Hull's Oscar-winning performance, and I liked Marian Hailey's Myrtle, though retaining the romance between her and Wilson (a superannuated Jesse White, who was better in 1950) is cringeworthy. All in all, it's straightforward and entertaining, but the movie, with its exteriors and additional dialogue and Henry Koster's sympathetic direction, is superior in pretty much every way.

The definitive production of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play "Harvey" is the 1950 film version, starring James Stewart as Elwood P. Dowd. Stewart knew a good role; over the next two decades, he continued to play Dowd onstage in the United States and in London ... on several occasions persuading Helen Hayes to co-star as Veta Louise. Miss Hayes had previously starred on Broadway in a flop comedy-fantasy called "Mrs McThing", by the same playwright who wrote "Harvey". Hayes was less enamoured of "Harvey" than James Stewart was (possibly because her role isn't nearly as good as his), and Stewart had increasing difficulty persuading her to join him in subsequent revivals of "Harvey".

The 1972 TV version of "Harvey" is competently done ... but, really, why bother? The film version is better. The film version successfully "opens up" the play, whilst this TV version is still painfully stagebound.

Jesse White, an excellent character actor, who played the asylum attendant Wilson in the original Broadway cast of "Harvey" and in the film version, repeats his role here. (For some reason, Wilson's forename has been changed for this TV version.) White was a very talented actor, but by 1972 he was too old to be playing a strong-armer who subdues maniacs. The scene in which he looks up the word "pookah" in the dictionary is too slow, and not funny at all. Marian Hailey (who?) is a complete waste of space as Myrtle Mae, admittedly an uninteresting role.

Fred Gwynne (who appeared with Helen Hayes in the Broadway cast of "Mrs McThing") is a surprising choice to play the small but pivotal role of Lofgren, the cab driver in the play's final scene. Gwynne gives an excellent performance here; it's a shame that he will be best remembered as Herman Munster rather than for his wide range of stage roles.

The best performance in this TV version of "Harvey" is that of John McGiver, as Dr Cholmondeley. McGiver was a character actor who (with very rare exceptions) basically spent his whole career giving variations of the same performance ... but that performance is always hilarious and delightful to watch. McGiver is very good here in his few scenes.

I've never understood the appeal of Helen Hayes. The so-called "First Lady of the American Stage" (a title which was hung on her by a Hollywood radio show) has never impressed me in any of her roles. Her performance here is much too subdued (even in the "white slaver" scene), and she definitely drags down the pace of this production of "Harvey". Even worse is Madeline Kahn's shrill, nasal performance in a small role as a nurse.

If you've only got room in your life for ONE giant invisible white rabbit, I urge you to skip this TV version of "Harvey" and rent the movie instead.