My daughter’s got a funny new mania: she needs beds for all her dolls and stuffed animals.  The girl’s got dozens of these friends, mostly gifts, collected in her almost four years as the-cutest-li’l-thing-you-ever-did-see.  It all started innocently enough, when she would put down the three miniature stuffed bears that came with her pretend veterinary kit.  She commandeered a set of woven nesting containers we weren’t using and made three little beds out of those;  Disney Princess matching cards made for sheets.  Then she began to work in bigger stuffed animals – her Snoopy, her Curious George, her Yurtle the Turtle, her Meow Mix Yellow Cat, a Cabbage Patch doll she got for Christmas, a Build-a-Bear she built, a doll baby that had once belonged to my wife.  These dolls are bigger and so require bigger beds.   Suddenly shoeboxes and other large containers (including hats) began to disappear from the house, while our supply of small linens (face cloths and hand towels), scarves, handkerchiefs and bandannas began to thin out mysteriously.  If you go into Vayda’s bedroom after lights out, you’ll find the floor almost impassable from the line-up of “beds” and “sleepers.”  It looks like a youth hostel or that crane shot of the Civil War field hospital from GONE WITH THE WIND (1939).  When I remarked to Vayda that this arrangement made navigating her room a bit difficult, she explained “I made a path” and pointed it out to me.   And so the hospitality suite continues to thrive, with new arrivals every day and the demand for materials increasing proportionately.  All this beddy-bye business has set me to thinking about scenes in movies where characters bed down together for the night strictly for the purposes of sleep.

Of course, once upon a time in Hollywood only same sex partners could lie together in the same bed, as in the example of Stan and Ollie at the top.  Married couples, even protected by the sanctity of holy wedlock, had to make do with twins.  It was risque enough in IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934) that unmarried travel companions Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert shared a room, even with their privacy and decency maintained by a suspended blanket they called”the wall of Jericho.”  I doubt that this setup was cinema’s first “strange bedfellows” arrangement but it’s a seminal text, if you will.  Beyond this example, however I’m not talking about movies in which characters share a room…

… but rather a single bed.  The scenario is conducive to drama, to comedy, to suspense and terror.  These elements – the loss of privacy, the forfeiture of comfort, the humiliation, hands and feet in the wrong places, the tug-o-war over the one blanket, the bickering, the snoring – create the perfect storm of conflict needed for good entertainment and share-a-bed scenes are among my favorite movie complications.

There’s lots of classic bed-frontations in the hundred year history of the movies, from Richard Basehart’s whaler wannabe Ishmael meeting his “dark complexioned” cannibal roomie in MOBY DICK (1956) …

… to Julie Harris and Claire Bloom cowering ‘neath the coverlet in THE HAUNTING (1964)…

… to FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS (1967) Jack McGowran and Roman Polanski’s sleepless night in a bloodsucker’s schloss…

… to the unfortunate (and hilarious) pillow exchange between castaway commuters Steve Martin and John Candy in PLANES, TRAINS & AUTOMOBILES (1987).  But I’m not talking about the characters’ discomfort here so much as my comfort.  I’m talking about the coziness of sharing-the-bed scenes.

In the past I’ve written about the coziness of films set aboard moving trains or scenes that take place inside a country tavern and it’s the same vibe I’m on about here.  Particularly in old movies, I love seeing characters getting under the covers together, preferably with some kind of gale blowing outside and perhaps the promise of a wall panel or bookcase sliding open to reveal a clutching hand or a pair of preternaturally glowing eyes.

Even in a comic context, I get a kick out of the gag and I think the appeal for me is that the gimmick of complete strangers forced to share a bed approximates the experience of going to the movies.  I began going to the cinema back before the dawn of the cineplex, which swapped out the creaky old flip-seats (with their two-ply cushions) with recliners and cup holders.  The cinema is more comfortable now but it’s still a compromise, you never quite feel at home, you’re always aware of the stranger in front of you, behind you, maybe even beside you.  If you go to the movies alone, as I used to do all the time, you always anticipate that struggle for the arm rest or having to get up to let someone out of the row.  You resent the inconvenience as you acknowledge that it’s perhaps an essential part of the experience of moviegoing.  Perhaps it’s all for the best.  Maybe being a bit on edge, a bit uncomfortable, a bit self aware makes you more receptive to what’s happening onscreen, less likely to doze off or multitask or text/sext/tweet.

This discussion certainly isn’t meant to be comprehensive, just evocative of the mood these scenes put me in.  You probably have your own favorites in this category.  So, come on, give ‘em up… share!