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Filed under: Headline Shooter Tagged: Betty Hutton, movies, Preston Sturges, Robert Benchley
Type "Robert Benchley" into IMDb, and you get a delicious list of eighty films under "Actor—Filmography," and fifty-three more (with overlap) under "Writer—Filmography." There are thirteen more in which he plays himself (sometimes as Robert, sometimes as Bob). Hooray, you cry, I'll go to Netflix and Move to Top of Queue! But when you arrive at the Robert Benchley page it is as bare as Ma Hubbard's larder. Three films grace it: Foreign Correspondent, Hollywood Musicals of the '40s, and You'll Never Get Rich. Where is Week-End at the Waldorf, My Tomato, Flesh and Fantasy (a.k.a. Six Destinies), The Bride Wore Boots, The Major and the Minor, That Inferior Feeling, How to Sub-Let, The Courtship of the Newt, The Romance of Digestion, or—a troubling omission—The Sex Life of the Polyp? Some of these are shorts, and all the more reason whey they should be available on DVD. Not all of this is Netflix's fault, but I have no doubt they could tighten the appropriate thumbscrews if they wanted to. Amazon has a better selection, but still Rafter Romance, no Stewed, Fried and Boiled, no How to Break 90 at Croquet. That Inferior Feeling, indeed!
Perhaps the most shameful absence is The Stork Club (1945), one of blonde genius Betty Hutton's funniest movies, in which Benchley plays droll lawyer Tom P. Curtis. There's a movement afoot to give Hutton a Lifetime Achievement Award (she's 83 now), and after you see this (along with Preston Sturges' superlative The Miracle of Morgan's Creek, on TCM this and next month) you'll know why.
It's not as though these are the only titles missing from Netflix, by the way. Careful now, my red-squared friend, or I may have to leave you for that highbrow Facets after all.
Benchley motion pictures [Robert Benchley Society]
Benchley films on TV this month [TV-now, via Benchley Society]
Living Legends of Classic Movies [ClassicMovies]
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Emdashes, founded in 2004, is currently written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. (Unsigned posts through October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.)
The site is designed and maintained by House of Pretty and illustrated by Jesse Ewing for Inkleaf Studio. Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (who also draws our daily comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The kissable Emdashes logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World; PDF, p. 20)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, man about town, and New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Report: Learning to read with comic books--that are edited by Françoise Mouly (for Print)
- Interview: Designer Eleanor Grosch (for Print)
- Proposal: a better-designed Metrocard (for A Brief Message)
- Review: Charles Addams: A Cartoonist's Life by Linda H. Davis (for Newsday)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Review: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Report: Eustace Tilley spruces up for The New Yorker's website redesign (for Print)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Micro-essay: on saving time through inspiration (for A Brief Message)
- Review: books about various New Yorker cartoonists by Liza Donnelly and Iain Topliss (for Newsday)
- Profile: screenwriter and novelist Joe Keenan (for Newsday)
- Review: The Complete New Yorker (for Print)
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Comments
Heh. You think the absence of Benchley (possibly the best American humorist of the 20th century) on Netflix is bad? Try looking for Lee Tracy. Or the wonderful Robert Montgomery. Someone has got to light a fire under the butts of the folks choosing what movies to release on DVD, and remind them what our priceless heritage actually IS.