Naughty Nineties, The (1945)
Director: Jean Yarbough
How does a motion picture about a showboat become synonymous
with the national pastime? I can answer that with another question: Who’s on
First? Comedic duo Abbott and Costello team up in yet another silly, goofball
comedy, filled with some of their more beloved routines including the timeless “Who’s
on First?” sketch in Universal’s 1945 picture The Naughty Nineties. Take a ride on this cinematic show boat that
is filled with comic gold.
The Naughty Nineties
is an Abbott and Costello comedy where the two funnymen help save a wholesome
showboat from falling into the hands of crooked gamblers. As Captain Sam (Henry
Travers) travels his prized showboat up and down the Mississippi with his wholesome
brand of entertainment he is swindled by a pair of crooked gamblers, Crawford
(Alan Curtis) and Bonita (Rita Johnson), for a controlling interest for his
prized floating venue. It takes the madcap cunning of the boat’s lead actor
Dexter (Bud Abbott) and show hand Sebastian (Lou Costello) to help keep Captain
Sam from being conned out of everything a he owns and loves, regaining full possession
for their friend and lovable boss with a deception of their own. Along the way are
set ups for many classic Abbott and Costello sketches.
The film is a goofy comedy with a rather weak plot that
serves to do nothing more than to set up moments where Abbot and Costello can
perform scenes they had perfected on the vaudeville stages several years
beforehand. Despite these sketches were
nothing new to the Abbott and Costello repertoire, for many audiences this
would be a first time they would experience the comedic genius of this classic
funny guy/straight man style duo.
Steered by long time B-level director Jean Yarbrough, whose
résumé consisted mostly of low budget horrors and comedies, this film’s
assembly is rather simple with hints of charm. Set in the fanciful 1890’s in
Middle America, this Universal feature utilized much of the studio’s backlot stock
form previous features to give its settings a more elaborate feel. Sadly the
same cannot be said about the direction, or use of the camera, which tends to
be stagnant, and at time amateur-like with its editing.
The film features the all-around fatherly and lovable Henry
Travers as the focus of its plot. With his sympathetic bumbling ways he is the
man which Abbott and Costello focus to help through the picture. Alan Cutis and
Rita Johnson portray the antagonists of the story, as a crooked gambler and his
sweet-talking beauty that attempt to take the Captain for his prized possession
and turn it into a floating house of fixed gaming. For Curtis this would be a
reversal of his character in his prior Abbott and Costello feature, Buck Privates, where he played the
romantic lead. Rita Johnson was an actress on the wrong side of 30 still
looking to find a way to make a major name for herself as she portrays the
beautifully dangerous villain of the picture.
In the end all the cumulative parts of this feature point to
Bub Abbott and Lou Costello simply performing their particular brand of comedy despite
the plot did not revolve around them. This style of comedy plays very much in
the same manner as Marx Brothers picture as they too had very little to do with
the actual plot, yet the entire film focused on their entertaining qualities.
Several of Abbott and Costello’s vaudeville acts would find variations
in this picture, including the “higher/lower” routine, where Costello mistakes
Abbott’s stage setting for pointers on his singing, and a Costello take on a
mirror scene, where he mimics another actor as if looking into a mirror.
The routine that stands above them all is the classic
rendition of “Who’s on Frist?” The sketch itself goes back well into the duo’s
1930s acts, but here in The Naughty Nineties
it is preserved in possibly its best manner. A classic routine where Costello
mistakes odd nicknames of baseball players called “Who”, “What”, etc. for Abbot
asking return questions to him remains a timeless comedic act that to this day
is revered as one of the best pieces of comedy performance. Careful listeners may
overhear film crewmembers chuckling in the background as they fight off
bursting into laugher while recording of this classic routine. These results
with hints of chuckles are left in the final cut of the picture showing just
how funny these men were at their peak,
The movie remains a simple goofball comedy at best, but to
see Abbott and Costello doing what they do best is what makes this feature
enjoyable. Today the film remains rather forgotten, yet “Who’s on First?” plays
in the hearts and minds of comedians and fans as an ever present reminder of
one of the 20th century’s finest moments of comedy. The sketch of
“Who’s on First?” is so beloved that it plays on a continuous loop at the
National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY for its brilliance and
reference to the sport which it references.
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