Yours, Mine and Ours *** (1968, Lucille Ball, Henry Fonda, Van Johnson) – Classic Movie Review 8638

Director Melville Shavelson’s 1968 family film Yours, Mine and Ours is the true-story based comedy in which widowed dad of 10 children Frank Beardsley (Henry Fonda) weds widowed mother of eight kids, Helen North Beardsley (Lucille Ball), and all hell lets loose, despite naval captain Frank Beardsley (Fonda)’s strict methods of discipline. That’s 18 school lunches!

Yours, Mine and Ours is a pleasing, goodhearted, capably written farce, with Ball’s comedy stridency and Fonda’s grouchy persona bringing an edge to the sentimentality. Ball and Fonda perform sweetly together, though you have to accept the movie magic of her pregnancy at the age of 58. Van Johnson supports as warrant officer Darrel Harrison, the friend who pairs them up. Among the kids there are Tim Matheson and Morgan Brittany (then Suzanne Cupito) as Mike and Louise Beardsley.

The screenplay by Melville Shavelson and Mort Lachman is based on the book Who Gets the Drumsticks? by Helen Eileen Beardsley, via a story by Bob Carroll Jr and Madelyn Davis.

It was nominated for two Golden Globes: Best Motion Picture – Comedy or Musical and Best Actress – Comedy or Musical (Ball).

Also in the cast are Tom Bosley, Louise Troy, Tim Matheson, Morgan Brittany, Sidney Miller, Nancy Howard, Walter Brooke, Gil Rogers, Nancy Roth, Gary Goetzman, Holly O’Brian, Michele Tobin, Maralee Foster, Tracy Nelson, Stephanie Oliver, Jennifer Leak, Ben Murphy, Eric Shea and Greg Atkins.

It was remade as Yours, Mine & Ours (2005) with Dennis Quaid, Rene Russo and Jerry O’Connell.

In March 2009, Bob Hope’s Emmy Award-winning joke writer Mort Lachman died three days before his 90th birthday. His jokes were told at 11 Oscar ceremonies and six Grammy Awards shows. He worked with Hope for two decades before he became a TV sitcom producer for shows like All in the Family and Kate & Allie.

In 2019 Tim Matheson appeared in Child’s Play.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8638

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