Fred Astaire

Debbie Reynolds

Lilli Palmer

Tab Hunter

Gary Merrill

Charles Ruggles

Harold Fong

Elvia Allman

Eleanor Audley

Edith Head

Lomax Study

William Perlberg

Gordon Cornell Layne

Alma Macrorie

Edward Warschilka

Tambi Larsen

Hal Pereira

Sam Comer

Frank R. McKelvy

Wally Westmore

Charles Grenzbach

Hugo Grenzbach

Joel Moss

Whitey Hughes

Cornelia Otis Skinner

Samuel A. Taylor

George Seaton

Robert Burks

Hermes Pan

Alfred Newman

Comedy

The Pleasure of His Company

Paramount Pictures

United States of America

CinemaSerf

There is something of the "Philadelphia Story" (1940) about this film. Debbie Reynolds is "Jessica" a San Francisco sophisticate who is about to marry hunky Texan cattleman "Roger" (Tab Hunter). Their wedding is all set when her absentee father "Pogo" (Fred Astaire) turns up and chaos ensues. His ex-wife - her mother - "Katharine" (Lili Palmer) and her new husband "James" (Gary Merrill) are soon at the end of their tethers and it seems that only their cook "Mrs. Mooney" (Elvia Allman) will put up with his annoying and selfish antics. Around an hour in I actually felt sorry for poor old "Roger": tempers are fraying; "Pogo" seems to have it in for him and his dreams of a perfect wedding appear to be going the way of the dodo. Pre-wedding jitters or the Machiavellian scheming of his soon-to-be father-in-law? There are moments when this is funny - and Reynolds goes at it was enthusiasm and gusto, but after a while I found the joke started to wear a bit thin, and there was a subtle, but definite, nastiness that seemed to creep in to try and string out the story for almost half an hour longer than it ought to have been. I imagine this would have worked far better on stage, the slightly episodic nature of the story would probably work better there offering a better avenue for the punchlines the are frequent, but not always very strong. I also found George Seaton made a bit too much use of Alfred Newman's rather dominating score, too. It's enjoyable enough, but with a cast of this calibre I was expecting something just a bit better.

English

The Pleasure of His Company

Cast

Reviews