Kiss Them for Me ** (1957, Cary Grant, Jayne Mansfield, Leif Erickson, Ray Walston, Larry Blyden, Suzy Parker, Werner Klemperer) – Classic Movie Review 5878

Director Stanley Donen’s 1957 CinemaScope and DeLuxe Color comedy Kiss Them for Me stars Cary Grant, Jayne Mansfield, Leif Erickson, Ray Walston, Larry Blyden, Suzy Parker, and Werner Klemperer.

Cary Grant, Ray Walston and Larry Blyden star as a trio of World War Two American naval officers who get mixed up with gals (Jayne Mansfield, Suzy Parker) on shore leave in San Francisco. There they hire a posh hotel suite for one heck of a weekend party.

This 1957 effort is a flat and disappointing comedy from Cary Grant and his movie-making partner, director Stanley Donen, who find that they cannot do much with Julius Epstein’s surprisingly tepid comedy script taken from the same novel (Frederic Wakeman’s Shore Leave) and play (Kiss Them for Me by Luther Davis) that produced the MGM hit show Hit the Deck (1955).

Grant’s effortless star appeal and suave style as Commander Andy Crewson are the film’s main saving graces, though also Walston is funny and Mansfield is amusing.

Also in the cast are Werner Klemperer as Lieutenant Wallace, Leif Erickson as shipyard magnate Eddie Turnbill, Jack Mullaney, Ben Wright, Michael Ross, Harry Carey Jr, Frank Nelson, Barbara Gould and Ray Montgomery.

It was advertised as ‘They tried so hard… so very hard… not to fall in love!’

Producer Jerry Wald encouraged Grant to take the part despite his concerns that, at age 53, he was too old to play a U.U Navy flier convincingly. The part was created on stage in 1945 by the 30-year-old Richard Widmark.

Grant asked that Donen direct, though he had never met or spoken to him before, but he had been impressed by his light comedic touch with his films. It is the first of their four films together, followed by Indiscreet (1958), The Grass Is Greener (1960), and Charade (1963).

Donen did not like the script and agreed to direct because ‘you don’t turn down Cary Grant’.

It had its world premiere at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, and released in the US on 10 December 1957 and in London on 19 December 1957.

It is Suzy Parker’s feature film acting debut, Ray Walston’s first film and Nathaniel Frey’s first film. Parker’s speaking voice is partly dubbed by Deborah Kerr.

Frederic Wakeman’s source novel Shore Leave was inspired by his experiences in the US Navy was a satire on war contracts.

It runs 105 minutes.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5878

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