Bedtime Story
Directed by Ralph Levy
Written by Stanley Shapiro and Paul Henning
1964/USA
Pennebaker Productions/The Lankershim Company/Universal Pictures
First viewing/YouTube
[box] Freddy Benson: Oh, dad, I see you’ve got a lot to learn about women. Let me tell you somethin’. The more you lie to them, the more you take ’em, the rougher you treat ’em, the better they like ya.[/box]
Despite the promising cast, this sex comedy fell flat for me.
Lawrence Jameson (David Niven) has spent years perfecting his persona. He poses as the prince of a country that is on the brink of destruction. Wealthy widows immediately drop their diamonds in his lap at this approach. Freddy Benson (Marlon Brando) poses as a GI who seemingly has a grandmother from every country in Europe in need of an operation. Beautiful young women cough up the dough every time.
Lawrence and Freddy meet up on a train to the French Riviera. They immediately begin competing for King of the Mountain. Both men soon set their sights on beautiful, sweet Shirley Jones. By this time Freddy is posing as a psychosomatic paralytic who needs a psychiatric cure, Lawrence is usually one step ahead of him.
Marlon Brando could do light roles but this one is just not for him. The plot calls for him to lose all dignity on several occasions and he is not funny. Add to that the fact that none of the wormen in the film has a brain in her head. I kept waiting for Shirley Jones to outwit these guys but it was not to be. A disappointment.
The story was remade as Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988) with Steve Martin and Michael Caine.
Re-release trailer
