P.Sellers and the P.P.

[MathGirl]

Umm.... This may sound obvious for the older folks here, but I've just discovered a wonderful movie. I just rented and watched "The Pink Panther" with Peter Sellers. The clothes, makeup, etc. were outdated (1963), but it was wonderful. PSellers is one of the most brilliantly funny actors I've ever seen. The sight gags were great, and PS has a unique way of being fluid and graceful while bumbling and awkward. I've never seen anyone but Charlie Chaplin with that talent.

I'm tempted to go rent the whole series and spend the next 48 hours watching them, but I'd hate to rush through them. I'm going to try to limit myself to one a week.

I suppose this is very old hat to many, but I feel like I've discovered a diamond amongst a bunch of turds.
MG

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

MG,

Ain't it fun to stumble on something like that? It's a cliche, but PS was a comic genius. When you finish the PP series, be sure to check out "Dr. Strangelove, The Mouse That Roared, What's New Pussycat". The latter is uneven but also has Woody Allen.

RF

 

[Guest]

some things are foverver funny

My dad and I still say "Does your dog bite?" and "Do you have a room?" to make each other crack up.

I will call my brother and say "KAAAA TOOO"...

Laughing while looking for my Lee- sance for my minkey,

b

 

[Guest]

Re: some things are foverver funny

"Do you have a room?"

BK, Just reading your rheuumm quote cracks me up remembering. In 1965 or so I had an LP of Sellers bits; I'd pay a lot to have or hear it again. Merely his voice created great theater, profoundly comic and tragic.

Have fun, Maths. There's also an old B&W film, title escapes me, but Sellers plays a small town librarian, utter wit and fun. He also played in a film of the black comedy "Waltz of the Toreadors". He made some crap but I'd watch him in anything.

Perdita

 

[Guest]

for MG:

Had to look them up for you.

Being There (1979)

Only Two Can Play (1962) the librarian I mentioned

Lolita (forgot to copy year; directed by Kubrick)

Mouse That Roared, The (1959) he plays a few parts including the Grand Duchess Gloriana XII

 

[jfinn]

I love this movie, but the thing I remember most about it is a story David Niven told in his memoir, The Moon's A Balloon where he got frostbite on his penis when sking after shooting a scene and using a glass of brandy to thaw his frozen privates.

He was also supposed to be the star of the show originally and Clousseau was just a secondary character, but Peter Sellers was so brilliant that Blake Edwards, the director, ordered the script rewritten to put the emphasis on him thereby reducing Niven's role to straight man.

Jayne

 

[MathGirl]

Re: for MG:

Dear Perdita,
Thank you for those. I'll try them after I've done the PPs.

Dear Jayne,
David Niven was very good in the PP. I've always liked him.
MG, Putting the Senor and myself to bed.
Ps. Hope Walter next door takes the hint.

 

[Vincent E]

• Sykes (1994)

• King Lear (1987)

• Trail of the Pink Panther (1982)

• The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu (1980)

• Being There (1979)

• The Prisoner of Zenda (1979)

• Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978)

• To See Such Fun (1977)

• Murder by Death (1976)

• The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976)

• Great McGonagall (1975)

• Ghost in the Noonday Sun (1974)

• The Return of the Pink Panther (1974)

• The Blockhouse (1973)

• Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1972)

• Hoffman (1970)

• There's a Girl in My Soup (1970)

• The Magic Christian (1969)

• I Love You, Alice B. Toklas (1968)

• The Party (1968)

• The Bobo (1967)

• Casino Royale (1967)

• Woman Times Seven (1967)

• After the Fox (1966)

• The Wrong Box (1966)

• What's New, Pussycat? (1965)

• Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

• The Pink Panther (1964)

• A Shot in the Dark (1964)

• The World of Henry Orient (1964)

• Heavens Above! (1963)

• The Pink Panther (1963)

• Lolita (1962)

• Only Two Can Play (1962)

• Trial and Error (1962)

• Waltz of the Toreadors (1962)

• The Wrong Arm of the Law (1962)

• The Battle of the Sexes (1960)

• I'm All Right, Jack (1960)

• The Millionairess (1960)

• Never Let Go (1960)

• Two-Way Stretch (1960)

• Carlton Brown of the F.O. (1959)

• The Mouse That Roared (1959)

• The Naked Truth (1958)

• Tom Thumb (1958)

• Up the Creek (1958)

• The Smallest Show on Earth (1957)

• The Case of the Mukkinese Battle Horn (1956)

• John & Julie (1955)

• The Ladykillers (1955)

• The Goon Show Movie (1953)

• Down Among the Z Men (1952)

 

[Guest]

V., King Lear: who played Lear? Why don't I know this film?

Perdita

 

[Quasimodem]

Amid the "Return," "Revenge," "Strikes Again," etc, don't overlook the second Clousseau in the series "A Shot In the Dark." The only one without a PP title.

When you have finished with Clousseau, or just need a hiatus, for sight gags, you can't beat "The Party."

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

Amid the "Return," "Revenge," "Strikes Again," etc, don't overlook the second Clousseau in the series "A Shot In the Dark." The only one without a PP title.

When you have finished with Clousseau, or just need a hiatus, for sight gags, you can't beat "The Party."

"The Party" the only movie to ever feature Andy Williams ex-wife Claudine Longet riding an elephant. Of course that was before she blew down her ski buddy (Swede Savage?).

Rumple (full of useless trivia) Foreskin

 

[thebullet]

A Shot in the Dark - the best Clouseau movie was a play adapted to the character for the movie - also starring Elke Sommer, the sexiest woman in movies in the 1960's.

Saw it in 1964 on a double feature with "Some Like it Hot"
Now that's a great double feature!

 

[MathGirl]

Thank you all for the information. I'll be up to my skinny bottom in Peter Sellers movies until about Christmas. Does anyone remember the name of the movie in which PS plays the stupid White House gardener who everone believes to be a wise man? I think it was one of PS's last.
MG

 

[Quasimodem]

. . . PS plays the stupid White House gardener who everone believes to be a wise man? . . . MG

Being There

A simple-minded gardener named Chance has spent all his life in the Washington D.C. house of an old man. When the man dies, Chance is put out on the street with no knowledge of the world except what he has learned from television. After a run in with a limousine, he ends up a guest of a woman (Eve) and her husband Ben, an influential but sickly businessman. Now called Chauncey Gardner, Chance becomes friend and confidante to Ben, and an unlikely political insider.

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

Thank you all for the information. I'll be up to my skinny bottom in Peter Sellers movies until about Christmas. Does anyone remember the name of the movie in which PS plays the stupid White House gardener who everone believes to be a wise man? I think it was one of PS's last.
MG

"Being There" (1979) he played Chance Gardener. The book is also a winner.

RF

ps: Dang it! Quasi beat me to the post.

pps: If Elke wasn't it a class by herself, it sure didn't take long to call the roll.

 

[MathGirl]

"Being There" (1979) he played Chance Gardener. The book is also a winner.

Dear Quaz and Rumple,
Thank you. I must find the book. How did I know you would both know the answer?
MG
Since we're on the subject of movies, my dad is a big fan of the .... unusual. Two of his favorites are "My Name is Nobody" and "Evil Roy Slade." My favorite, by a wide margin is "The Meaning of Life," but I also love John Astin as Evil Roy. Did Dick Shawn always play characters like Bing Bong? The only other movie I've seen him in is "Mad Mad World," and he played a hyperkinetic weirdo in that one, too. It must be obvious that I grew up watching movies which were made before I was born.

Dear Vincent,
That's quite a list. The question is, though, what is it a list of. PS movies?
MG

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

If I buy Playboy in braille, what's the centerfold like? Quasi

About like the rest of the mag., kinda bumpy. RF

 

[Quasimodem]

. . . Did Dick Shawn always play characters like Bing Bong? The only other movie I've seen him in is "Mad Mad World," and he played a hyperkinetic weirdo in that one, too. . .

Dick Shawn seems to have been a poorly-utilised comedic actor, who died of a heart attack in 1987. When he did work, it was usually memorable.

Beside as you mentioned, “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World,” and “Evil Roy Slade,” some of my favourite Shawn roles, include some funny exchanges with Richard Benjamin in “Love at First Bite,” a transvestite hooker in “Angel,” and an oily Hollywood agent in “Maid to Order.”

 

[thebullet]

Dick Shawn also played a super-straight officer in "What did you do in the War, Daddy?" with James Coburn and Henry Morgan 1967

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

One more Dick Shawn, and I'm sure it just slipped Quasi's mind; Adolph Hitler in the original movie version of Mel Brooks',"The Producers." with Zero Moestel and Gene Wilder.

RF