kyyankee

When I saw this as an 11 year old I truly collapsed watching Jan Murray's descent into madness. The genius of this show, unappreciated at the time, was the skilled construction of plots made from simple premises turning into unexpected wild conclusions. The actors and writers were veterans of vaudeville and burlesque. The tried and true comedy elements of repetition, inside jokes and stock characters are refined sharply in each episode. This is one of the best episodes of a classic sitcom.

By the way, Fred Gwynne does a little singing in other episodes, and he was a bass baritone. So his tenor voice here was a dubbed performance of someone else.

I hadn't seen this film in years. It is available from 3 or 4 pay sites, but I lucked into a freebie (albeit with commercials) on the Cinevault streaming channel. It's a great take on the heist genre. It's a little slow to get going, and Jim Hutton has to do a lot of early heavy lifting until the heist itself.

The film is able to use the specilaties from some of the best comedy actors of that time. Bob Denver is a nice guy, Milton Berle a conniver, Walter Brennan the old grampa and so on. Every one of them fits and advances the story. Even an then unknown Jamie Farr makes an appearance.

A little seen gem, now available on DVD.

I saw this great film in a theater in 1956. It had the same effect on me that the great whale had on Ahab himself. I was only a child, but the vivid images, tremendous performances and the lyrical words of Herman Melville transmitted through the mind if Ray Bradbury made for a riveting experience. It remains my single favorite film, one that I've watched dozens of times.