The Nutty Professor (1963)

100 Best Science Fiction Movies from Slant Magazine

 

#81. The Nutty Professor (1963)

 

Jerry Lewis is one of those enormous talents that I mostly bounce off of. I didn’t like his style during his years of greatest popularity, even though I can’t deny he was a Master of it, much like I didn’t like the style of his leading student, Jim Carey. Over time both Lewis and Carey moved beyond their familiar schticks, but in Carey’s case it was towards better films while Lewis’ work went into decline even as he, himself, became easier for me to tolerate.

 

Lewis doesn’t get the credit he deserves for his behind-the-camera innovations. He invented “instant play-back” so Directors could have a better idea of how the scene looked without waiting for the rushes at the end of the day (for the movie "The Bellboy" (1960)). His version was technically primitive, but there were advances that followed his lead, and that instant playback created a revolution in film production when it was combine with digital photography decades later.

 

Lewis also had an undeniable sense of comic timing, and behind-the-camera he combined that with a great eye. His films he Directed, even the lousy ones, were Edited with extreme sharpness (his first Directorial outing was the short “How to Smuggle a Hernia Across the Border” (1949) and his last was an episode of the TV show “Good Grief” (1991)). Also, most were alive with color, always just slightly exaggerated, setting the environment for the over-the-top zaniness that played out within (Lewis’ hand is undeniable on all aspects of Production, but here the listed Cinematographer was W. Wallace Kelly, Editor was John Woodcock, and Art Directors were Hal Pereira and Walter Tyler).

 

This, which he co-Wrote with Bill Richmond, is easily his best film. An unrelentingly Farcical, but surprisingly compassionate, it’s reinvention of Robert Lewis Stevenson’s Horror novel, “The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” (1886), but all the darkness has been replaced with sweetness. It’s wall-to-wall with highly improbable sight-gags that work marvelously. It’s an Underdog Comedy that was likely a balm for Lewis following the hurtful break with his Comedy Partner, Dean Martin, only five-years before.

 

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Lewis played a socially incompetent, clumsy, but good-hearted Chemistry Professor, Julius Kelp, who develops a secret formula allowed him to transform himself into a magnetically handsome, ultra-cool, but also obnoxious, Lounge Lizard named Buddy Love. Julius reflects Lewis’ long-perfected schtick, Buddy was obviously a spoof on Martin, so Lewis got to play both sides of what used to be a double-act. (Some have also noted that Villainous Buddy foreshadowed Lewis’ on-stage persona in his later years.)

 

There isn’t a hint of Naturalism in the interactions in this film, demonstrated in that the first major sight-gag is borrowed from a “Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner” (series of animated shorts, first one 1949), followed immediately by Julius keeping his job even though he’d almost, accidently, killed a classroom full of students and set-off a campus-wide panic. While Lewis revels in the double-roll, one must also admire the rest of the cast for being so at-ease in their un-natural reactions to him. This is especially true of Stella Stevens as Julius’ Student Stella Purdy, she’s drawn to Buddy but with a streak of compassion for Julius, yet both of Lewis’ Characters are so wildly extreme they both should’ve sent running to the opposite direction. Maybe it’s better that Comedy, in general, has mostly moved beyond such exaggeration, but it’s still nice to see it done this well.

 

The first transformation is especially deftly done, relying far more on exotic use of brightly color paints than FX-makeup, but the makeup employed deliberately evoked the 1931 version of “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” which featured Fredrick Marsh in the double-role.

 

Buddy’s first appearance is so marvelously exaggerated it sold many of the exaggerations that follow. Filmed from his POV, as he crosses the street from a Men’s Appeal Store to the Purple Pit Nightclub, the people stare at him in shock, as if he were as brutishly simian as the ’31 Mr. Hyde. But no, the last few women passed before entering the Club have looks of … well … interest. When Buddy is revealed, he’s good-looking, not that good-looking, but still, after that set-up, we get it.

 

No doubt, the film is crass. Stella tolerates way-too-much from both versions of Lewis for audience to swallow, worse she seems to almost admire Buddy’s mistreatment of her. In a flashback, Julius sees his father, played by Harold Morris, being verbally abused by his mother, played by Elvira Allman, explaining his own propensity to allow others to bully him, a clumsy Freudian connection between the Super Ego as weakness expressed in Julius and the unrestrained Id of Buddy. Assertive women are a source of script discomfort and in the end, Julius’ Dad triumphantly forces the Mom into submissiveness.

 

On the other hand, in the Real-World, how many Narcissistic Monsters, demonstrating nothing but self-absorption and contempt for their adoring fans, are allowed to live at the Top-of-the-World for far-too-long?

 

In a famous piece of dialogue, Buddy is rude to a Bartender, played by Buddy Lester, but doesn’t get tossed out of the Club. Buddy asks for a cocktail invented for the film, "Alaskan Polar Bear Heater":

 

Bartender: “Never heard of that.”

 

Buddy, all posturing and smug: "Until now. Now listen up. Two shots of vodka, a little rum, some bitters, a smidgeon of vinegar ...”

 

The Bartender interrupts, "You going to drink this here, or are you going to take it home and rub it on your chest?"

 

Buddy: “Hey, that was terrific! Hey, did ya hear that, folks? A regular George Bernard Shaw. Good boy! And he did it all by himself. You did all by yourself and nobody helped you. That's terrific... And with your very own big mouth! Now if you don't want this cocktail shaker to be a part of your gums, mix the drink, shut your mouth and pay attention. Is that clear? ...A shot of gin, a little brandy, lemon peel, orange peel, a cherry. And some more scotch. Now, mix it nice. Pour it into a tall glass."

 

Buddy downs it with ease. The curious Bartender sips it and collapses.

 

(No, I haven’t tried it. I looked up tasters on the internet and they didn’t like it.)

 

It’s a plot point that any time Buddy shows even a hint of decency, he starts reverting back to Julius. The climax is when this happens before witnesses, leaving Julius emotionally naked before his peers, who had little respect for him even before this humiliation. In a moment of self-examination that neither Julius nor Buddy was capable before, Julius said, “If you don’t think too much of yourself, how do you expect others to?”

 

It ends happily and sentimentally, as it should. Wrote Critic Eric Hendrickson, “Of all Lewis’s films, ‘Nutty Professor’ may be the closest to achieving an unfussy plea for pathos.”

 

Trailer:

The Nutty Professor (1963) trailer - YouTube