Richard Schickel (1933–2017)

It is impossible to tabulate how many millions of people have been entertained by these witty and sophisticated mysteries featuring a husband and wife. The huge success of The Thin Man, the original 1934 film based on Dashiell Hammett’s novel of the same name, prompted MGM to break new ground by producing an “A” picture sequel, and follow that with four more “A” pictures featuring William Powell and Myrna Loy as Nick and Nora Charles.

The original film introduced the sophisticated and fun couple we all have come to love over the years. The Thin Man was set over the Christmas holiday and was the first time audiences got to enjoy the banter of Nick and Nora, as ex-detective Nick was pushed into action, martini in hand, by his better half. Nora had the money and Nick had the know-how. Clyde Wynant, portrayed by Edward Ellis, as nearly everyone knows, was actually Thee thin man. But the tag stuck to Nick Charles and the rest is, as they say, screen history. A very pretty Maureen O’Sullivan is a standout in the original film as the young Dorothy Wynant.

What delighted audiences, however, was the playful fun between Nick and Nora as they solved the mystery. When Powell and Loy returned as Nick and Nora a couple of years later, the magic that had surrounded the original was still there, and would remain so through the last entry.

AFTER THE THIN MAN was nearly as much fun as the original, as Nick and Nora, to Nora’s delight and Nick’s dismay, became involved in another mystery set immediately following their adventures in the original. All the fun was still there as was the mystery. Nora told reporters in the film: ���Nick was sober in Kansas City!” Their dog Asta was back again as well, and became a household name. A young Jimmy Stewart got to star in this one also.

In ANOTHER THIN MAN Nick and Nora returned for another breezy and fun comedy/mystery done with style, class and top drawer production values from MGM at it’s zenith. This one is probably my favorite of the series.

Little Nicky Jr. is a year old and proud parents Nick and Nora are having a ball. Nick is trying to get out of going to Long Island because Colonel McFay (C. Aubrey Smith) only wants him to go over financial reports and other mundane matters that might interfere with Nick’s drinking. But there is also a threat on the Colonel’s life. Since Nora wants a quiet weekend in the country, off they go. It turns out to be anything but quiet, of course, and Nick has to solve another murder.

A sharp and clever script with snappy dialog keep this one moving along nicely. Pretty Virginia Grey is the Colonel’s daughter Lois and Ruth Hussey plays little Nicky’s nurse, Dorothy. Lois wants to marry Dudley Horn (Patrick Knowles), much to the chagrin of the Colonel and his secretery, Freddie (Tom Neal), who is also in love with the lovely Lois. It seems some of the Colonel’s business dealings have been just a little on the shady side since the death of Nora’s father, his business partner. Phil Church (Sheldon Leonard) may have been on the wrong end of one of these shady deals and with all this going on you can guess what happens next.

The interplay between Nick and Nora about their quiet little weekend is a ton of fun. A body in the road and a pool-house fire get things moving quickly in this light and breezy entry in the series. Nat Pendelton is along as Lt. Guild this time and Marjorie Main has a nice turn as a very funny landlady. Muriel Hutchison also has a nice role as Church’s girlfriend, Smitty, in a mystery a little more complicated than you might think.

This time the gathering of suspects, including Don Costello as Diamond Back Vogel, takes place at a birthday party for Nicky Jr. thrown by Nick's old pals. Shemp Howard of Three Stooges fame has a funny role as Whacky, as does Harry Bellaver as Creeps. Otto Kruger is on hand as Assistant D.A. Van Slack when Nick surprises everyone with the killer’s identity.

One of the highlights in a film with many fine moments is a scene at The West Indies Club. Nora learns a little more about Nick’s past there than he would like! This is a fun film to watch, and there is a magic here which can never be duplicated. This is five-star entertainment you don't want to miss.

SHADOW OF THE THIN MAN

The most fun and sophisticated series in the history of film continued with Maj. W.S. Van Dyke's 1941 entry, Shadow of the Thin Man. Nick and Nora become involved in yet another murder mystery, and Loy’s Nora is cuter than she’s ever been in this one. Nick is busy in the park reading a fairy tale to Nicky Jr. — which sounds suspiciously like a racing form — and it isn’t long before Nick and "Mummy" are off to the track.

A jockey has just been murdered by the time they arrive with a police escort and it appears to be tied in with a gambling syndicate. Nick does his best to avoid getting roped into real work but when another murder occurs at a wrestling match and a reporter who’s an acquaintance of theirs is fingered for the job, Nick sort of saunters into action. A third murder occurs before Nick can get it all sorted out. A gun hidden in a drain pipe, an expensive bracelet used as payment for blackmail and a ledger worth killing for all play a part in the mystery portion of this one. When Nora gets one of the clues first, a trap is set for the killer. Nora is adorable and she ends up "saving" Nick's life by the time the denouement scene rolls around.

An attractive cast of MGM players which includes a funny turn by Louise Beavers as the Charles’s maid and a very young and pretty Donna Reed as the girlfriend of the accused, make this one easy to watch. Nick gathers the suspects all together as usual, and it’s quite a surprise when he fingers the real killer.

Nick and Asta get dizzy on a carousel in this one, Asta starts a brawl in a restaurant, and there’s a turtle race just adding to the delightful murder mystery fun.

THE THIN MAN GOES HOME.

While still keeping the fun and wit of the other films, this entry does has its critics. I am not one of them. Nick goes home to Sycamore Springs and has eased up a bit on his social activities (getting tight) and Nora seems more the traditional wife in this entry. This is normal and in keeping with the story of a wife visiting her in-laws, and the facade.

This one was still a lot of fun and taking issue with such minor nuances is unfair to the film. While perhaps a tick below the others, it was still a rewarding experience. I’m sure this entry is probably the favorite of someone.

SONG OF THE THIN MAN

Manhattan meets the hip jazz scene in this one as Nick and Nora are involved in solving another delicious murder, with nice touches from Nicky Jr. and, of course, their dog Asta. It begins when Nick and Nora have a night out on the gambling ship, “S. S. Fortune.”

The film opens with a young and stunningly beautiful Gloria Grahame singing “Your Not That Easy to Forget” and only gets better. As Nick and Nora rub shoulders with the elite — and a few of Nicky’s old pals — a chain of events leads to murder. When the chief suspect drops by and asks for Nick’s help, Nick promptly turns him over to the cops for his own safety. An attempt on the young man’s life ruins a bottle Nick had been saving for a special occasion, and as he puts it, “An old friend of mine went completely to pieces.” There’s no way Nick isn’t helping the young man — if for no other reason, that ruined bottle!

There are no shortage of suspects as Nick and Nora start nosing around, aided by a young Keenan Wynn as one of the hip band members. It’s funny as Nora begins to pick up the lingo of Wynn and his jazz friends, who seem to have a language all their own. The victim seemingly had no end of enemies. He was deep in debt to a dangerous gambler, had been cheating on his girlfriend, was running out on a contract for greener pastures, had publicly humiliated Grahame’s former boyfriend Buddy Hollis (Don Taylor), and more. Before it’s over, Nick and Nora will walk in on another murder, and Nick will stage a surprise back on the waters, gathering all the suspects back on the swanky “S. S. Fortune” to trick a killer.

Patricia Morison, Jayne Meadows, Dean Stockwell, Ralph Morgan, William Bishop and Marie Windsor all offer fine support to make this closing chapter in the legendary series one of their best. Some nice family moments (Nick and Nora style) with Asta and Nicky Jr. are put in the mix as well, Nicky Jr. is seemingly a chip of the old block.

The same carefree and fun loving ambiance that was a staple of every entry is here and a good atmospheric mystery to boot. There is nothing shabby in the least about “Song of the Thin Man.” These films set a bar that many have attempted to reach when making a light comedy/mystery. If you happen to get ahold of this complete set somewhere, you even get a bonus disc, Alias Nick and Nora, which is nice to watch.… (more)

3 1/2 stars: Good

From the back cover: When Walt Disney moved to Hollywood in 1923, the 21 year old cartoonist seemed an unlikely businessman-and yet in less than 2 decades, he'd transformed his small animation studio into the world's first multimedia entertainment empire. In The Disney Version, Richard Schickel explores Walt Disney's extraordinary entrepreneurial success, his fascinatingly complex character, and how -as his influence grew- the company he founded came not simply to reflect the values of mid century America but actually to shape the country's character.

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This book was recommended to me by my friend James, shortly before our post COVID Disneyland trip. He has read dozens of Disney books and he said this is his favorite. This gave me insight into the man as well as his creation and growth of the Disney corporation. The author himself admits he's hard on WED, but I didn't find it to be so much that I couldn't enjoy the book. At times it is a bit harsh, but often discussion of Disney is either idolatry or derision - for some reason its hard to find a middle ground? Perhaps that more than anything shows what we tend to think about him and the extraordinary company he created. Of course, people and life is more complex than binary opinions...

This book was very readable, and I learned quite a lot about Disney the man and the early days of the animation studios. Particularly that some of the offerings (notably, Sleeping Beauty) were not particularly well received at the time of release. One of Schikel's central theses is that Disney was trying to tame the "dirt" and "untamed wild" from his midwest upbringing, but I found this not proved in the slightest - just a convenient trope. What was much more proven, was that Disney brilliance was in many respects understanding what middle class middle America was interested in seeing for their entertainment and channeling those wishes into a media empire.

Some quotes I liked:

"The American midwest is a highly practical place. Its habit is to ask how much, how big, how far and sometimes how. It rarely asks why. The bluff and hearty manner it affects is not a conscious pose: it believes in its own friendliness and good spirits - and it is as surprised as anyone when clues to its hidden, darker side escape and intrude upon the carefully slow and easy surface it genuinely prefers for its habitat. It may or may not be afraid of the depths but it certainly dislikes them, finding them depressing to contempate and the work of explicating them of dubious practical value.

THe young Walt Disney might have been a rube, a cornball, a hick on anybody's scale of sophistication but he was something else as well. "History is made" by men who have the restlessness, impressionability, credulity capacity for make believe, ruthlessness, and self righteousness of children. It is made by men who their hearts on toys." [Eric Hoffer].

The determined informality of his manner was no affectation...it was this inbred sureness of his audience (which was merely himself multiplied) that led to his ultimate success and led people to misunderstand him.

It was estimated by 1934 he was taking in $660,000 a year in profit, most of which he was pouring back into his studio. Even so, it is clear that he had accomplished something of an economic miracle, for it must be remembered that the years of this stupendous growth in profitability were the years during which the rest of the country was wallowing in the deepest trough of the Depression.

[After an international trip] "I guess the cartoon is something everyone knows and likes" [WED}. That simple sentence speaks volumes. There was no character more American thatn Mickey Mouse, no environment more American than the small town locale he inhabitated with his gang. And yet the appeal of Disney cartoons is universal. [Reading this in 2021, after discussions of racial inclusion and seeing how the Disney company now has set more recent animation in various other locations, is interesting to consider].

WE may add to this the basic insight that the fantastic is always more acceptable to plain people - and sometimes to sophisticates - when it is rendered in the most realistic possible style. So, when offering time tested mythic material, Disney was careful to present it in everyday, down to earth artistic terms that offered no difficulties of understanding to the large audience - that in fact gentled them with the familiar instead of shocking them with the aesthetically daring. It was the way he personally preferred to arrive at the state in which disbelief is willingly suspended.

One must suspect that Disney found in Pinocchio elements of his autobiography. since he had himself been a child denied the normal prerogatives of boyhood. It is certainly possible that at least some portion of his drive for success was a compensation for his failure to find the father who had, in the psychological sense, been lost to him since childhood. This may also explain why he so relished the paternal role he was now beginning to play with such earnestness - and such ineptitude - with his employees.

[In the original Pincchio story, the cricket is crushed]. More important, the cricket was not squashed but developed. Appointed the puppet's conscience, he became Pinocchio's worldly wise mentor, ally and rescuer, serving him in rather the same manner that Roy Disney served his younger brother.

The advantage of the Disneyland site was that it would be no more than 27 minutes [HA!!!!] from the LA city hall once the freeway was finished. Its disadvantage was that the 160 acres it encompassed was owned by no less than 20 families.

Walt was the one most precisely in the American midstream - in taste and morality, attitudes and opinions, prides and prejudices. The revealing clue is his familiar (and utterly sincere) statement that he never made a picture he didn't want his family to see. His competitors made pictures they thought, or guessed, the public wanted to see. Disney operated through maximal identification with John Doe; the others seek to discover what John Doe was like in order to cater to him.

Disney said "I don't make films exclusively for children, I make them to suit myself....I've proved at least to myself and my stockholders, that we can make money, lots of money, by turning out wholesome entertainment. My belief is that there are more people in America who want to smile than those who want to be artistically depressed." He admitted that the works of Tennessee Williams, for example, might be great art, though they were not for him.… (more)