Palm Springs Weekend ** (1963, Troy Donahue, Connie Stevens, Ty Hardin, Robert Conrad, Stefanie Powers, Jerry Van Dyke) – Classic Movie Review 6242

‘IT’S WHERE THE BOYS ARE AND THE GIRLS ARE…that swingin’ vacation weekend when American youth descends on America’s swankiest playground!’

As a kind of follow-on from 1960’s Where the Boys Are, this one could have been called Where the Girls Are. Director Norman Taurog’s 1963 teen flick is a daft but bouncy and amusing slice of Sixties nostalgia.

Hunky heart-throbs Troy Donahue, Ty Hardin and Robert Conrad star as athletes who spend the long, fun-packed Easter Spring Break weekend in a Palm Springs, California, resort hostelry, where the girls are the alluring Connie Stevens and Stefanie Powers.

Of course ‘Palm Springs really swings!’ And this is ‘That vacation weekend when all youth busts loose and everything goes’. Ah yes, ‘So much fun, so little time.’

Even if the movie is no great shakes, certainly not up to its advertising, it is incredibly innocent, wholesome and amusing. And of course it is absolutely fabulous to see all these sweet players in their prime.

Also in the cast are Jack Weston, Andrew Duggan, Carole Cook, Jerry Van Dyke (as Biff Roberts) Zeme North, Billy Mumy, Dorothy Green, Robert Gothie, Gary Kincaid, Mark Dempsey and Jim Shane.

Donahue plays Jim Munroe, Hardin plays Doug ‘Stretch’ Fortune and Conrad plays Eric Dean. Lucky Jim finds romance with Bunny (Powers), daughter of the local police chief (Duggan).

The screenplay is written by Earl Hamner Jr, the creator of The Waltons.

Earl Hamner Jr died on 24 March 2016 in Los Angeles, aged 92.

Ty Hardin (1930–2017).

Ty Hardin, TV’s Bronco, died on 3 August 2017, aged 87.

Jerry Van Dyke (1931–2018).

RIP Jerry Van Dyke (1931–2018), the famed younger brother of Dick Van Dyke.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6242

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