I guess I’ll rush in where Angels fear to tread.

First, some minor carping, complaining and nitpicking.

I don’t know how Kaye’s Hollywood career could be considered relativelty brief. He was very active between 1944 and 1963 and was extremely popular in the late 40s and early 50s.

But the comment that really makes me wail and gnash my teeth is when you helpfully point out that this is not the movie where Kaye buys a holiday inn. You have to be referring to WHITE CHRISTMAS and that is definitely not its plot!!!!! I don’t have the energy or patience to clarify this for you. Besides, everyone in the United States of America knows its plot. Everyone except you. (Are you a citizen?) WHITE CHRISTMAS was a huge hit when it was released and has aired every Christmas season for many, many years.
It sounds to me like you don’t know much about Kaye or his movies.
Look, I generally enjoy your writing but, from my perspective, this is the biggest mistake ever made in a Morlock column. (I am holding back from calling it the stupidest and most idiotic.)
What are you going to say next? GONE WITH THE WIND was a movie set in the East?
Anyway, thanks for bringing the DVD to our attention. And be patient with me. But it is tough when someone makes a glaring, horrendous error about a movie that I and plenty of others have seen so many, many times.

Al, next week I’m writing up A Streetcar Named Desire, the great Neil Simon comedy set in Egypt. Probably best you don’t read that one.

The commentary sounds very, very interesting. Other than that, THE INSPECTOR GENERAL is a title I’ve seen in more bargain-basement VHS and DVD sales than any other single title!

But it is tough when someone makes a glaring, horrendous error…

Or, as I like to call it, has a bit of fun at the expense of people who confuse Holiday Inn with White Christmas. Al, just keep repeating to yourself “it’s only a movie… only a movie… only a movie…”

I’ve enjoyed the Kaye film where he has to remember “the vessel with the pessle” and “the flagon with the dragon”, and TSLOWalterMitty, so I am curious to see this new to me movie. FYI, PBS used to air a show called “Wishbone” starring a Jack Russell terrior, acting out famous stories from literature, and one of our family’s favorites was when the show presented The Inspector General. They also presented a great Frankenstein, the dog playing Dr. F. I know the show’s premise sounds whacky, but it was a great program, my kids still remember the literature portrayed, and Betty Buckley(broadway star, 8 is Enough) was the executive producer.

Hmm! Thanks for the still! I thought Elsa Lanchester only came in black and white…umm, yeah. My enjoyment of Kaye’s films is always somewhat diminished, in direct inverse ratio, by how much he is delighting in delighting himself, but he was something, wasn’t he?

Yeah, Bob, I nearly broached the subject of Kaye’s ability to divide a room but then I opted not to. Like Robin Williams, he’ll either have you rolling on the floor or rolling your eyes. And now, to contradict myself, I find I’m often smack dab in the middle. I do like him (Hans Christian Anderson remains a favorite even though the thing goes on forever and Hans gets a little obsessive in the second act) but as I said above it’s the supporting cast who really makes this for me, particularly Walter Slezak and Alan Hale.

And Al Lowe’s objections notwithstanding, I think Kaye’s mugging has a lot to do with his – I say it again – relatively brief (relative to his enduring fame) tenure as a Hollywood leading man. His most active period was when he was locked into studio contracts but end-to-end this period lasted only about 15 years (and as many films), with his last starring roles spaced pretty far apart. He just couldn’t sustain the same level of popularity, not in film, and he had greater continued success onstage and television – interestingly, where he was seen at a great distance and extremely close up! (He was also, of course, popular on the radio, where you couldn’t see him at all.) Most of us grew up with Kaye on TV, in his TV specials or pitching U.N.I.C.E.F. and he really does have that dotty old uncle quality – you kind of think he’s annoying but you love him just the same.

Jenni, I remember Wishbone and a friend of mine was one of the writers – makes me wonder if he wrote the Inspector General episode.

Laura and I and the kids are all very familiar with Wishbone to the point where I can make referential jokes to it and not lose anyone. It often comes in the form of someone doing something tangentially related to anything in literature, like saying, “I’m going up to my room,” at which point I put on the Wishbone voice and say, “That brings to mind one of the great works of literature, Jane Eyre. In it, Jane is…” Ah, yes, what’s the story Wishbone?

Wow, Wishbone’s been dead 10 years now.

I LOVE Danny Kaye and most of his films unapologetically. I fondly remember his variety show on TV from the 1960s because it often featured the last of the old-time show-biz stalwarts. Kaye was a terrific physical comedian, though his real schtick was a sort-of vocal gymnastics with word play (which is why we all remember “the vessel with the pestle with the brew that is true”). Perhaps it’s a style of comedy that is out of sync with contemporary humor, which is cynical, gross, snarky, or ironic–types of comedy I am really annoyed with because it’s so narrow and there is so little craft to it.

You couldn’t really fit in his biggest triumph — his stand at the London Palladium, where he was the toast of post-war Britain. Between that and UNICEF, he’s aces in my book.

No! Wishbone dead??!! Sniff, sniff! Really, that shocked me at first, but it shouldn’t as dogs don’t live a long time. I’ll always have the DVDs to remember him by! @Suzi, I thought of you as I’ve been watching the old tv show Route 66″ and today’s show was filmed entirely in Chicago. Starred some old-time actors too, Lou Adler, Glenda Farrell, and Frank McHugh, buddy of James Cagney.

Well, I’ll try this again.

Richard, by your standards, ALL movie comedians have relatively short careers. The Marx Brothers heyday was in the 30s and 40s. Bob Hope – and Abbott and Costello – peaked in the 40s. Jerry Lewis was most popular in the 50s and 60s. All made personal appearances and attracted audiences on television. (You might want to say that the Marxes made no personal appearances but they had been headliners in vaudeville and on Broadway; Chico Marx starred with a band all over the country. Groucho and Chico did radio and Groucho was very successful on TV.) Vaudeville and Broadway headliner W.C. Fields did radio and made his great movies in the 30s and 40s – until his death.

Kaye’s weekly TV shows were not ratings grabbers. CBS kept him because they liked him. They didn’t like Judy Garland and dumped her.
The sensational appearances in England were at the start of the 1950s.
His first movie, UP IN ARMS, was well liked and so were almost all the others (even those that sucked, like A SONG IS BORN) until the mid-50s. Amazingly enough, the wonderful COURT JESTER was not a hit at the time.
For a while he was one of the top 10 popular stars in some polls of exhibitors.
After 1956 he still made movies. I’m sure he and others wanted them to be popular. They weren’t. He made 2 in 1958, 1 in 1959, 1 in 1961 and 1 in 1963. A movie career from 1944 to 1963 is 20 years. So, I disagree with your assessment of his having a relatively brief, not too important movie career.
And, I think we all realize that actors’ and performers’ energy, vigor and how they age affects the length of their careers.

So, Richard, my friend, on this subject anyway, you don’t know what you are talking about.

Regarding your “It’s only a movie” comment, isn’t the Morlocks column supposed to be a place where you and your readers write about movies you care about?
This particular column was good in analyzing the movie and promoting the DVD.
It is bad in that you don’t seem to care about the facts and I don’t think you really care for the subject, Danny Kaye.

I maintain that Danny Kaye’s Hollywood career (as a film actor/star) is brief with respect to his lasting fame in that I suspect many people would be surprised that he only made as many movies as he did compared to, say, Red Skelton, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, or even Abbott and Costello, whose heyday lasted for as many years but who appeared in considerably more features. It wasn’t meant as a qualitative remark about his talent, and so your summation of my remarks (” … your assessment of his having a relatively brief, not too important movie career”) doesn’t reflect what I actually said.

As for your question about what the Morlocks blog should be, my answer is that it is exactly what we Morlocks want it to be. Many of us write elsewhere about movies in a more straight-faced, historical and informative fashion, but use this blog as something more personal, where we can talk about the movies we love with a little more ease and humor.

This whole thing reminds me of Victoria and her relatively short reign as Queen.

Anyway, what Richard says in the second paragraph is absolutely true. I think we’ve got a great blog going here and I’m proud to be a part of it.

Well, relatively is such a relative term.

Plus, isn’t anyone going to say something about Elsa Lanchester grabbing Danny Kaye’s junk?

Yes, it was quite ballsy of her. She clearly has the upper… er… lower hand.

I think Elsa probably wanted a little junk on the side, as her husband was getting junk on the side. Same KIND of junk too.

Al- I won’t object to any argument you made with Richard. It reads pretty harsh though, in tone.

I’ve always liked Danny Kaye. I know he is an acquired taste, and I wouldn’t expose just anybody to his movies, but he had a great period of fun films in his “relatively brief” starring vehicles.

I’d like to see “Merry Andrew” again, where a timid professor type joins the circus. I remember seeing it in color at the drive-in when I was young, and a decade or so later on my black-and-white TV. And I still remember most of the song “Everything is Tickety-boo” and the song Kaye’s character made of the Pythagorean theorem. So I guess that says that when Danny got paired with the right song, it was very memorable. I think the Pythagorean and other mathematical theorems should always be taught as songs!

Dear Jane H- Enjoy.

Rats! “Embed Disabled”! Curse you, YouTube!

I could be wrong, but my impression was always not that Kaye ceased to be popular in films but rather that he lost interest in making films, preferring other work (such as tv, plays, and concerts) which didn’t involve as much sitting around.

dukeroberts, you’re absolutely crackers!

Why thank you, Jane. I am a big cracker fan. I enjoy crackers of all types and stripes, including but not limited to saltines, Ritz, Chicken in a Biscuit, Wheat Thins, Triscuits and Sociables. Unfortunately, most are made of wheat and I’m allergic to wheat. However, they are making some great things with rice these days.

What an absolute delight!!!! I am so fabulously excited about this! Danny Kaye has been my favorite comedy actor since I was a kid and it’s so nice that a great disc of this has finally come out. Great write up & I can’t wait to grab one & dig in to all those special features…

Well, If I was in Elsa’s shoes, I might have done the same thing. For fun and knowing it was on camera to boot. I love Danny Kaye, everything I have seen him in. I agree that most people I know either love him or…”meh”. I am not a fan of Robin Williams, never have been. He makes my skin crawl. I will take Danny Kaye, whether he is in an Inn or not.

I’ve read mixed opinions of Kaye’s off-camera personality, but Basil Rathbone — the villain in “The Court Jester” — enjoyed working with him. He was especially impressed at Kaye’s mimicry skills, which extended to fencing at Rathbone’s level after comparatively brief training.

I have always enjoyed watching “The Inspector General”. My mom and I used to watch it on PAX channel(now ION television) for the midday movie. It was so funny! We would laugh and laugh. I have also seen “The Court Jester”. It is very silly, I love it! My sister and I grew up watching “Wishbone”. It really did help my love of literature. I have read a great many books and not all of them for school. Movies can give us such happiness, especially when the actors are so talented. Thanks for the article.

Of course I have to chime in here — Kaye is my long-time favorite comedian. Check out my stash of Kaye memorabilia in my closet and you’ll understand! I think “The Inspector General” is a great movie, as RHS says because of a top-notch supporting cast, lush production values, classic comedy routines and a liberal dose of romance. Kaye’s great in the movie, with a really good acting job and quite charming and vulnerable.

I *do* think Danny had a brief movie career, brief in terms of only a dozen and a half features over his career, and that’s much less than most major screen comedians. I was always so frustrated with only 17 or so titles to collect stills from instead of the dozens that other top comics churned out.

I think of his movie career as something that could have been so much more had he been, perhaps, not with Sam Goldwyn at the beginning and instead had a chance to go with a bigger studio with more potential output. That could have had other consequences for him, but we’d have more Kaye titles to ponder, probably. And Warner Bros. should have let him do “Marjorie Morningstar”!

Such a divisive comedian, simple and yet incredibly sophisticated, and probably too talented for his own good. Though you didn’t hear as much about his abrasive personality during his prime movie years, he sort of got a reputation as less-than-pleasant later on, something I saw much later when I had a couple of occasions to be present at a TV taping and in an interview setting at his house. He did not suffer fools, that’s for sure, but also left stories of what we’d consider inappropriate snippity-ness in his wake. I still love him, but he was a classic many-faceted clown with a deep intellect and the complexity to match.

I’m glad to hear that the Henry Koster footage is included. I had seen this many years before when it was shopped to us at TCM in the early days of the channel — along with much other Koster footage – and I feared I’d never see it again. Fears averted!

I’m also assuming the transfer is superb — too many awful public domain prints circulated around but this is a gorgeous movie and Danny has seldom looked so great or that backlot so quaint!

Always glad to read anything about my favorite Danny!

I *do* think Danny had a brief movie career, brief in terms of only a dozen and a half features over his career, and that’s much less than most major screen comedians.

Certainly, Kaye was around for a long, long time, in one medium or another. My original point was that, as you say, he made fewer movies than I’d bet most of his admirers remember. My observation was never meant as a qualitative assessment of Kaye’s worth or value to the entertainment industry, which is why I was dumbfounded by the extreme reaction. Comparing his career to anyone else’s only muddied the waters. I think it does a lot of us good to spend a little extra IMDb time (as I often do) looking at the specific resumes of certain actors to appreciate the arc of their brilliant careers.