Evening star., 1951-08-17

Hal Wallis could not have
known how it would be with col
1ege football this third week in
August but he could not have
made better guess than in the
comedy, That's My Boy" at the
Warner.
This Jerry Lewis-Dean Martin
tape started out to be a cinema
slapstick which also turned out
to be satire on Americas great
fall festival sport.
What is more, it is good solid
entertainment in both respects,
the irony of it being handled more
expertly by Comedian Eddie
Mayehoff than the starring pair
manages the roughhouse. This is
praise indeed in view of the fact
that Lewis and Martin never have
been better ON the screen. It is
no more, however, than is. Maye-
hoff's due. The man who vowed
Broadway in Season in the Sun"
last season is about to get the
huge audience he deserves in
That's My Boy"
This is very funny man and
the way he pairs off with Lewis
in their father and son roles. re-
spectively, will convince a lot of
thoughtful fans that he would
make a better partner for the
daffy young comedian than
Singer Martin.
x X x
The hilarity of Cy Howard's
script for the Paramount produc-
tion does not stem from the fact
that it is fresh. 1t is the story of
the worm that turns which is at
least as old as worms. The gay
ETY. of it on this occasion is that
the worm role is played by Lewis
whose frenzied style has found its
best cinema slapstick frame.
AS the ugly duckling college
freshman who lives out of medi-
cal kit and needs telescope lenses
in his spectacles. Lewis gets to run
the gamut of his tricks. What is
helpful here is that they are part
of continuing story instead of
the usual episode items that
made previous Lewis Martin films
look like pictures of their night
club routines.
Despite the wiser use of the
young comic team in That's My
Boy" Mayehoff comes danger
ously close to stealing the picture.
He plays a former All-Ameri-
can football star, a middle-aged
adolescent living on his athletic
clippings 20 years later. The shock
of discovering that he has pro-
duced such a physical wreck of a
son might have been fatal except
for one thing, If he can't get him
on football team any other way,
he will buy a place for him by
pairing him off with another kid
who is real football star. The
school simply cannot have one
without the other and it makes a
hilariously funny deal.
1t is a better than average script
from the standpoint of invention
that Howard has dreamed up for
That's My Boy
Few things have been as funny
lately in the movies as the break |
fast scene in which the father
eats a ton of food while the son
tries to swallow a single pill; an
other in which the worm-like kid
muffs his first chance on the grid
iron by running across the other |
teams goal-line; or even such a
small sequence as that in which .
the weakling tries to sleep with
his dormitory window closed. /
1t is nicely flexible tempo at
which Hal Walker has directed
the Paramount comedy. The pace
is leisurely enough to let Mayehoff
make his pompous old athlete
points without rushing and picks
up to take care of Lewis higher
speed in such a scene as that in
which he tries to jitterbug with
an elderly math teacher.
Even those who have remained
aloof to the slapstick antics of
Lewis and Martin so far will find
a lot to reward them in their