Was Rise and Shine (1941) Game Over For Collegiate Capers?
The joke of Jack Oakie playing a football hero
was twofold: the unlikelihood of his doing a same in real-life, plus absurdity
of his continued casting in such part over a ten year period. Jack couldn't
hear and would watch colleague lips for cues. Now that's greatness got at a
disadvantage. Interesting how major talent would hook onto collegiate subjects:
here it's Mark Hellinger producing andJames Thurber/Herman J. Mankiewicz (same years as Kane for HJM) on
story and screenplay. Were they high on nostalgia for rah-rah they'd once
known? You'd think with such talent involved that Rise and Shine would be
better, which is not to say it's bad ... overlong by fifteen minutes maybe ... and there are echoes of 20th's Hold That Co-Ed, which as they may
have recalled, lost money.
Yikes! Twelve years after SWEETIE and Oakie still can't graduate! From what I see, '41 was a key year for the change over from traditional college comedies to the campus-like fantasy world of post-draft pre-war items like BUCK PRIVATES, CAUGHT IN THE DRAFT and GREAT GUNS, etc. Plenty of girls, laughs and instead of the big game climax we get the big war game battle! I'd also argue the crazy-ass-family comedy was its own depression era sub-genre, as prevalent as collegiate musicals. Think THREE CORNED MOON, MY MAN GODFREY, ON THE AVENUE, THE ROYAL FAMILY OF BROADWAY as well as YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU.
I started at Penn State in the summer of 1964 as a leading edge of the baby boom generation. Like the proverbial pig-in-a-python, we boomers distorted every institution we came in contact with--first public housing, then grade school, high school, and finally the gates of higher education. So it seems to me that the makers of those pigskin love fests were the upper-class writers and producers who had actually gone to college in those pre-war years. College was not for average folks, so it seems likely film about the experience would not resonate with those same average folks and therefore offer a smaller audience for the offerings.
I saw this on an afternoon movie, probably cut, around 1960 or so and liked it a lot. I assumed for years that it was just my childish affection for a silly comedy. But then I finally saw it again just last year and loved it anew. I recognize that it's really not all that good, but I found it endlessly amusing.
It's a major shame, however, that Ruth Donnelly wasn't allowed to play the same schtick she presented in the earlier portions of the movie throughout. The character had less to do and was tamed and softened after such a strong and hilarious opening. If she'd been able to play the same early character in the same fashion till the end, it might have been one of the great comic performances ever.
With war clouds on the horizon and the draft already in effect, perhaps 1As playing college football -- or being in college at all -- was suddenly questionable. And the fantasy of college as a kingdom for overgrown / oversexed kids likely became too much of a fantasy with the outside world dragging that age group into harshest reality.
The college fantasy set forth by silents like "The Freshman" and updated through "Where the Boys Are" did survive, although my impression was that big college sports gave way to pop music (music acts in student hangouts being cheaper to film than games in a stadium).
Is there an auteurist case for Dwan, or did he just live a long time?
Anyway, I don't know about Rise and Shine, but Thurber did co-write a very good play-turned-movie involving college football, The Male Animal, which does have the bite missing here.
RISE AND SHINE may have been the last college try for the duration as far as the major studios were concerned, but the format held fast at Monogram, where the campus was a handy place for its young-adult players Frankie Darro (LET'S GO COLLEGIATE), Gale Storm (LET'S GO COLLEGIATE and CAMPUS RHYTHM), and Peter Lind Hayes (ZIS BOOM BAH). When Fox and Universal brought back the college comedy in 1952 (MONKEY BUSINESS, BONZO GOES TO COLLEGE), Monogram was right behind them (HOLD THAT LINE and THE ROSE BOWL STORY).
7 Comments:
Yikes! Twelve years after SWEETIE and Oakie still can't graduate! From what I see, '41 was a key year for the change over from traditional college comedies to the campus-like fantasy world of post-draft pre-war items like BUCK PRIVATES, CAUGHT IN THE DRAFT and GREAT GUNS, etc. Plenty of girls, laughs and instead of the big game climax we get the big war game battle! I'd also argue the crazy-ass-family comedy was its own depression era sub-genre, as prevalent as collegiate musicals. Think THREE CORNED MOON, MY MAN GODFREY, ON THE AVENUE, THE ROYAL FAMILY OF BROADWAY as well as YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU.
I started at Penn State in the summer of 1964 as a leading edge of the baby boom generation. Like the proverbial pig-in-a-python, we boomers distorted every institution we came in contact with--first public housing, then grade school, high school, and finally the gates of higher education. So it seems to me that the makers of those pigskin love fests were the upper-class writers and producers who had actually gone to college in those pre-war years. College was not for average folks, so it seems likely film about the experience would not resonate with those same average folks and therefore offer a smaller audience for the offerings.
I saw this on an afternoon movie, probably cut, around 1960 or so and liked it a lot. I assumed for years that it was just my childish affection for a silly comedy. But then I finally saw it again just last year and loved it anew. I recognize that it's really not all that good, but I found it endlessly amusing.
It's a major shame, however, that Ruth Donnelly wasn't allowed to play the same schtick she presented in the earlier portions of the movie throughout. The character had less to do and was tamed and softened after such a strong and hilarious opening. If she'd been able to play the same early character in the same fashion till the end, it might have been one of the great comic performances ever.
With war clouds on the horizon and the draft already in effect, perhaps 1As playing college football -- or being in college at all -- was suddenly questionable. And the fantasy of college as a kingdom for overgrown / oversexed kids likely became too much of a fantasy with the outside world dragging that age group into harshest reality.
The college fantasy set forth by silents like "The Freshman" and updated through "Where the Boys Are" did survive, although my impression was that big college sports gave way to pop music (music acts in student hangouts being cheaper to film than games in a stadium).
Is there an auteurist case for Dwan, or did he just live a long time?
Anyway, I don't know about Rise and Shine, but Thurber did co-write a very good play-turned-movie involving college football, The Male Animal, which does have the bite missing here.
Jack Oakie was deaf? Amazing. I could never tell from watching him.
RISE AND SHINE may have been the last college try for the duration as far as the major studios were concerned, but the format held fast at Monogram, where the campus was a handy place for its young-adult players Frankie Darro (LET'S GO COLLEGIATE), Gale Storm (LET'S GO COLLEGIATE and CAMPUS RHYTHM), and Peter Lind Hayes (ZIS BOOM BAH). When Fox and Universal brought back the college comedy in 1952 (MONKEY BUSINESS, BONZO GOES TO COLLEGE), Monogram was right behind them (HOLD THAT LINE and THE ROSE BOWL STORY).
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