Almanac Comedy: Favourite Comedies #10 – #9

 

 

 

#10 Steve Martin- Let’s Get Small (1976), Man With Two Brains (1982)

 

Fundamentally The Man With Two Brains is one of the silliest, non-sensical films of all time and it was hugely popular with me and my friends in the early 80’s.

 

The story of a widowed brain surgeon Dr Hfuhruhurr played by Martin, who almost accidentally kills the sexy, manipulative Kathleen Turner and saves her by giving her a new brain, is utterly ridiculous but this is Steve Martin in his element.

 

Kathleen Turner, sending up her femme fatale role in her previous film Body Heat, is brilliant as the Doctor’s new wife who isn’t interested in him physically and is only in the relationship for the money.

 

As Dr Hfuhruhurr says, “I’ll have you know, in the finger sucking department, I’m extremely satisfied!” or “That was the best sex without actually having sex, that I’ve ever had”.

 

Having met another brain doctor, the insane Dr Alfred Necessiter played by David Warner, Dr Hfuhruhurr discovers that Necessiter has a bunch of brains back at his laboratory that are being kept alive for possible transplanting.

 

Amongst the brains, the Doctor finds he has a psychic connection to one of them which happens to be his ex-wife, Anne who he adored. What he needs to do now is get the perfect body (Turner) and replace her with Anne’s brain.

 

Directed by the late legend of comedy Carl Reiner, this farce still holds up today due to the commitment of the cast who must have struggled to keep a straight face.

 

Martin’s first collaboration with Carl Reiner was in 1979 with the hugely successful, The Jerk. Again it contains the lovable “clunkiness”  of Martin’s stand up as he plays a white man raised by a black farming family, who is cast out into the real world.

 

His character Navin Johnson literally is the most naïve individual imaginable and he navigates his way through a series of compromising situations and falling in love, all with his faithful dog Shithead by his side.

 

The Jerk is an excellent companion to The Man With Two Brains as is his 1982 film, also directed by Carl Reiner, Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid, a film noir parody. This was a clever film as Reiner used half a dozen classic films, edited scenes and cut them into Dead Men as part of the script. It’s actually a beautiful black and white film as well as being a solid comedy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Steve Martin also produced and starred in an Oscar nominated short film called The Absent Minded Waiter in 1977 with Terri Garr and the great Buck Henry who created Get Smart. This was the perfect vehicle for Martin and a seamless extension of his stand up.

 

 

 

 

The album Let’s Get Small was recorded in 1976 in San Francisco and captures Martin at the height of his stand up career. Martin had a long career in comedy before film, starting in the 50’s working at Disneyland as a kid where he learned magic tricks which he brought into his stand up.

 

He also used the banjo which he is a maestro of, and has been awarded Grammy’s for his bluegrass band The Steep Canyon Rangers.

 

Lets Get Small highlights the genius of Steve Martin as a ground breaking artist of note in the 70’s and it was to be the start of something much bigger for him personally.

 

In the days before the internet etc, we used to sit around the turntable knowing too well what punch lines were about to be delivered and still laugh our heads off to this album. I used to include many of the tracks off it for mixed tapes I would make for friends. An absolute classic.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

#9 – Don’s Party (1976)

 

Australia was restless in the late 60’s after two decades of Liberal governments and the emergence of Gough Whitlam as a possible challenger for PM in 1969 was an exciting and turbulent time.

 

Playwright David Williamson’s play is set at a suburban Sydney home on the night of the 1969 election and brings together a bunch of post graduate misfits, larrikins, professionals, ‘wannabees’ and just plain drunks.

 

The dialogue and the casting is brilliant and it was one of many films of that era that gave us depictions of the real authentic Australia. When Whitlam finally made it to PM in 1972, he opened the purse strings for films of this quality to be made.

 

Sunday Too Far Away, Breaker Morant, Wake in Fright, My Brilliant Career, Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith and The Adventures of Barry McKenzie were just a few.

 

The Bruce Beresford-directed Don’s Party isn’t pretty. It’s bloody funny but it holds a mirror to an ugly time of misogyny and booze that people of my generation will remember well. You can almost smell the beer and cigarettes as you watch it.

 

The performances are outstanding, led by John Hargreaves as Don, Ray Barrett as the disgraceful Mal, a consultant and self-confessed bullshit artist, and his long suffering wife Jenny (played by Pat Bishop who won the AFI Award for best supporting actress) who “cops it” from all angles for her defiance to what’s occurring.

 

This film is a national treasure as is the play. I was fortunate enough to see a version of the play starring another national treasure, Garry McDonald and directed by Graeme Blundell, one of the stars of the film, and it remains one of the highlights of my life.

 

Don’s Party is a wonderful snapshot of a tumultuous time in Australian politics and smashes through our cultural cringe.

 

A warning that the following trailers contain nudity and coarse language.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Part 1: #27 – #20 can be read HERE

 

Part 2: #15 – #19 can be read HERE

 

Part 3: #12 – #14 can be read HERE

 

Part 4: #11 can be read HERE

 

 

Read more from Ian Wilson HERE

 

 

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