Tarzan’s New York Adventure *** (1942, Johnny Weissmuller, Maureen O’Sullivan, Johnny Sheffield) – Classic Movie Review 8046

Director Richard Thorpe’s 1942 Tarzan’s New York Adventure is the lively and exciting final outing for the much-loved screen partnership of Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O’Sullivan together as Tarzan and Jane.

In it, Tarzan and Jane travel to the stone jungle in America to rescue Boy (Johnny Sheffield), who has been kidnapped from the jungle by circus owner Buck Rand (Charles Bickford) and taken there to perform in his show.

The movie is helped by the change of locale from the jungle to America and by a lot of silly comedy. There are lots of amusing culture-clash jokes – Tarzan encounters indoor plumbing! – as well as cheeky chimpanzee Cheetah for slapstick fun. New York Adventure is an inspiration for Crocodile Dundee.

O’Sullivan liked her human co-star Weissmuller – ‘an amiable piece of beefcake, a likeable, overgrown child’ – but not her primate one. According to O’Sullivan’s daughter Mia Farrow, she referred to the chimpanzee as ‘that ape son of a bitch’.

Elmo Lincoln, the first ever adult actor to star as Tarzan in 1918’s Tarzan of the Apes, makes an uncredited appearance as a circus roustabout. Also in the cast are Virginia Grey as Connie Beach, Paul Kelly as pilot Jimmie Shields, Russell Hicks as Judge Abbotson, Chill Wills as Manchester Montford, Howard C Hickman as Tarzan’s lawyer Blake Norton, Cy Kendall as Colonel Ralph Sergeant, Charles Lane as Sargent’s lawyer Gould Beaton, Miles Mander as portmaster, Anne Jeffreys as young woman, William Forrest as inspector at airport, Willie Fung as Chinese tailor Sun Lee, Marjorie Deanne as cigarette girl, Eddie Kane as headwaiter Eddie, Mantan Moreland as nightclub janitor Sam, Dorothy Morris as hat check girl and Jackie the Lion.

Tarzan’s New York Adventure is directed by Richard Thorpe, runs 72 minutes, is made and released by MGM, is written by Myles Connolly and William R Lipman, is shot in black and white by Sidney Wagner, is produced by Frederick Stephani and is scored by David Snell.

Weissmuller was said to have performed his own high dive stunt as an escaping Tarzan jumps 250 feet from the top of the Brooklyn Bridge, but it is now alleged that the shot was filmed by cameraman Jack Smith on top of the MGM scenic tower on lot three, using a dummy plunging into a tank of water.

O’Sullivan played Jane in Weissmuller’s first six Tarzan films before getting tired of the role and quitting: Tarzan the Ape Man (1932), Tarzan and His Mate (1934), Tarzan Escapes (1936), Tarzan Finds a Son! (1939), Tarzan’s Secret Treasure (1941) and Tarzan’s New York Adventure (1942). Tarzan’s New York Adventure is also the sixth and final film in MGM’s Tarzan series and its last Tarzan feature until 1958’s Tarzan’s Fight for Life. It is another Tarzan film primarily shot on MGM’s back lot, though it also includes scenes set New York and the usual jungle sequences.

O’Sullivan wanted to devote more time to her film director husband John Farrow and her seven children, so she made it her last film till 1948.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8046

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