Fine Lace
This is not only about a treat, it's at tale that rights a historic entertainment wrong. First, some important background on why.
In 1941, the play Arsenic and Old Lace by Joseph Kesselring opened on Broadway. It's one of my two favorite "whimsical plays" of that era, the other being Harvey by Mary Chase. Arsenic and Old Lace had a very successful run, with 1,444 performances, over three years. In fact, even after the subsequent 80 years, it's still the 12th longest-running play in Broadway history. (Harvey, which opened in 1944, is still the 6th longest-running.)
The comedy starred Alan Joslyn as Mortimer Brewster, the nephew of two dotty aunts Abby and Martha played by Josephine Hull and Jean Adair who very sweetly kill lonely old men, all alone in the world with no families, by serving them their homemade elderberry wine laced with poison. The bodies are buried in the basement by the old ladies' equally nutty brother who thinks he's Teddy Roosevelt and believes the mean have died of Yellow Fever while building the Panama Canal. The plot takes an even more convoluted turn when Mortimer's murderous brother Jonathan returns home to hide out from the police, arriving with a surgeon who has changed Mortimer's appearance as a disguise -- the only problem being that the doctor had gotten drunk the night of the plastic surgery and watched a horror movie, and so Mortimer's new face looks like Boris Karloff, which he hates. The great fun for theatergoers was that the role of Mortimer was originally played on Broadway by...Boris Karloff!
When Warner Bros. made the movie adaptation, they shot it during the run of the play, with the agreement that it wouldn't be released until the play closed on Broadway. Cary Grant took on the main role of Mortimer, with Josephine Hull and Jean Adair getting an eight-week leave of absence from the play's producers to recreate their by-then famous roles as the Brewster sisters. Also, John Alexander, who played Uncle Teddy on Broadway, recreated his performance for the movie, as well. However, Columbia Pictures, which held Boris Karloff's contract, had recently been burned when lending out one of their actors to another studio, and wouldn't give Karloff a release to appear in the film -- also, since the play was still running, the Broadway producers weren't anxious to lose four of its stars at the same time for two months. So, Karloff stayed on stage in the play.
The movie was wonderful -- with the one omission of Boris Karloff not playing the character who looks like Boris Karloff and hates it. Raymond Massey played the role, and with Karloff-like makeup did a very good job. But he's not Boris Karloff. And so that movie performance was lost forever.
In 1955, CBS television did a drastically cut-down version of the play, and Boris Karloff finally got to play the role again for the production. Unfortunately, that version is lost to the world, as far as I know. A further shame because it had a very good additional cast -- the sisters were played by no less than Helen Hayes and Billie Burke (the "good witch" from The Wizard of Oz). And Peter Lorre recreated his movie role as the surgeon, Dr. Einstein. And John Alexander again recreated his Broadway role of Uncle Teddy. Orson Bean played Mortimer. So, yes, that is a great production, even cut down so much -- but lost for viewing, as far as I know.
There was, however, one other TV adaptation of Arsenic and Old Lace. It was made in 1962 for the Hallmark Hall of Fame. And once again...Boris Karloff got to play his role in it.
Which brings us to the point of this.
After learning that the video existed and looking for it for a while, I tracked this down about three years ago on Amazon Prime. And wrote an article on it. But just when I was about the publish the piece -- the video was taken out of circulation "in your area". I kept checking back each week (honest, each week), but it never was put back into into rotation. Then, the other week, in what was either a stroke of inspiration...or a moment of foolish, "Why didn't I look there before??!," I checked back in YouTube -- and found it! (Whether it had been there for a while or only just recently was added, I don't know. I was just glad that I found it. And glad that I didn't have to keep checking every week.
Here is that 1962 Hallmark Hall of Fame production of Arsenic and Old Lace with Boris Karloff in it!! So, we finally get to see Boris Karloff in the Boris Karloff role after 85 years -- and with a wonderful cast throughout.
The lead role of Mortimer is played by Tony Randall who, while no Cary Grant, does a very nice job.
As the two balmy sisters, the Hallmark production features two gems Dorothy Stickney and Mildred Natwick. And those their names might not be familiar to most audiences today, they are significant.
For starters, Dorothy Stickney was actually the first actress the script was sent to for being in the original Broadway production. She was not only an acclaimed actress, but was married to legendary writer Howard Lindsay who was one of the producers of the play, along with his partner Russel Crouse. Dorothy Stickney is probably best known today for playing The Queen in Julie Andrew’s TV version of Cinderella. She was also in the original Broadway cast of The Front Page as Mollie. And “starred in Life with Father, which opened in 1939 and still is the longest running play in Broadway history, running for seven years and 3,224 performances. (By the way, her husband Howard Lindsay co-wrote with Russel Crouse Life with Father,” as well as The Sound of Music. And also the musicals, Anything Goes by Cole Porter and Irving Berlin's Call Me Madam.)
As for Midred Natwick, she's probably best-known today for playing Rock Hudson's mother in the TV series McMillan & Wife -- and for getting an Oscar nomination in Barefoot in the Park (repeating the role she created on Broadway), She was also in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Trouble with Harry and such John Wayne classics as The Quiet Man and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. On Broadway, she played the off-beat medium in Noel Coward’s Blithe Spirit, and George Bernard Shaw’s Candida. And she's received two Tony nominations for Waltz of the Toreadors, as well as the Kander-Ebb musical 70, Girls, 70.
So, yes, this TV production did extremely well for itself in its casting of the Brewster sisters. But the rest of the cast in supporting and small roles were very good good.
The role of Uncle Teddy is played by Tom Bosley, only a couple years after winning a Tony Award for my fave musical Fiorello! -- and a decade before starring in Happy Days.
The surgeon Dr. Einstein is played by George Vokovec, who movie fans will recognize as the immigrant juror in the classic Twelve Angry Men. And another actor for this TV production, in a small role as one of the police officers (the big, lunky one), is one of of my favorite Broadway character actors, Nathaniel Frey who, among other things, played opposite Tom Bosley in Fiorello! and is probably best known for singing the song "You Gotta Have Heart" in the original Broadway production of Damn Yankees, a role he recreated in the movie version.
In other words, this is an very good production of Arsenic and Old Lace -- even if Boris Karloff wasn't in it. And Boris Karloff is in it!!
(A slight digression why I'm even more pleased to have found this. After learning several years back that the video existed and looking for it for a while, I finally tracked this down about three years ago on Amazon Prime. And I even wrote this article on it, which I've updated. But just when I was about the publish the piece...the video was taken out of circulation "in your area". I kept checking back each week -- honest, each week -- but it never was put back into rotation. Then, the other week, in what was either a stroke of inspiration...or a moment of foolish, "Why didn't I look there before??!," I decided to check back again in YouTube -- and found it! Whether it had been there for a while or only just recently was added, I don't know. I was just glad that I found it. And glad that I didn't have to keep checking every week.)
This Hallmark Hall of Fame production is very good and a huge amount of fun. Just know that it too, like the earlier TV version, is trimmed down greatly for television, with a running time of 77 minutes -- a full-hour less than the stageplay. The trimming down does force the play to be a a bit more rushed than the pacing of this quaint, whimsical story ideally should have. And Karloff, 21 years after originating the role on Broadway, is clearly older than the character should be who's playing Tony Randall's brother.
But -- there is not getting around the all important "but." But this is a very good production...and we finally get to see Boris Karloff on "film" in the role he created that is about a character who hates looking like Boris Karloff.
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