The Girl Can't Help It (1956) Jayne Mansfield, Tom Ewell, & Little Richard!

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Ladies and gentlemen.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
The motion picture you are about to see is a
story of music. I play the role of Tom Miller,
an agent, a small time theatrical agent.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
Who had been a well you'll see this.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Motion picture was photographed and the grandeur.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Of cinema scope.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
And pardon me.

Speaker 2 (00:44):
As I was saying, this motion picture was photographed and
the grandeur of cinema scope, and in gorgeous life like
color by Deluxe. Gorgeous life like color by Deluxe. Sometimes

(01:11):
you wonder who's mining the store.

Speaker 4 (01:15):
Hello, and welcome to Book Versus Movie. The podcast. We
read books that have been adapted into movies and then
we try to decide which we like better, the book
or the movie. I'm Marco p at columbiabook dot com
and this is my good friend and co host Marco
D of Brooklyn Pitchick.

Speaker 5 (01:29):
How are you every one?

Speaker 4 (01:31):
Very very excited about today? I've got my pink water tumblr.
Not enough pink, I'm not I'm not so much a
pink person, but I like it. I'm I'm in that
kind of pink cloud frame of mind as we talk
about Girl Can't Help It, starring the amazing Jane Mansfield.

(01:54):
We will get to all of that, the Jane and
Mickey of it all in a little bit. But in
case you're new, welcome, Welcome. This is a podcast where
we read books. Well, we say books, it's not always
a book, I'll be honest. Basically, we cover film adaptations.
As long as it's a film that has been adapted
from some kind of original source, it's on the table.

(02:17):
And our only ground rules are that everything has to
be widely available. Film has to be streaming on a
major platform. Source material has to be easy to get
our hands on. In this case, we're talking about a
short story that was published in The Atlantic by Garson Canaan,
and we'll talk about that in a second. But if
you're brand new and you have suggestions for movies that

(02:39):
we can cover that are based on fiction non fiction,
a play, a song, a poem, a magazine article, we
will consider it. We are always looking for ideas. We
still haven't filled out the rest of the summer programming,
So if you're curious about what we've covered in the
past and you have some suggestions for things that we
cover in the future, you want to meet other listeners

(03:01):
of this podcast, there are a few places where you
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Speaker 5 (03:06):
Yes, we do have a basic Facebook page, but we're
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Podcast group and ask to join. You do have to
ask to join, and we really do just really do
just talk about books and movies there. I for some reason, Margo,
I decided to just tool around Facebook the other day
and it was a bad idea. I mean, it's kind

(03:27):
of a mess. We really keep our page about books
and movies like a little bit of pop culture. We
really keep it about the show, and I really appreciate that.
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(03:47):
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Speaker 4 (04:05):
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Speaker 5 (04:27):
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put those clips there so you could check it out.
But some of the like Morgo said, we've done this
for eleven years, so from everything from twenty twenty three

(04:48):
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We also put things there for free, including these clips,

(05:10):
but also the old old episodes, so maybe there's an
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So we want to thank everyone that supports us on Patreon,
and are we ready to start the show? We are.

Speaker 4 (05:28):
I'm glad you pointed out the Seven Year Itch because
there is a big tie in with the movie that
we're talking to today. So if you have never seen
Girl Can Help It, first of all, you are missing out.
Second of all, you're gonna want to watch that and
then go right back and watch Seven Year Itch again
for a number of reasons. But let's talk about our writer.
We talked about Garson Kanaan, who wrote our source material

(05:52):
when we talked about Born Yesterday, which is an amazing
script and movie starring amazing Judy Holiday in just a
jaw dropping role, tremendously complicated and sophisticated dialogue he and
his wife. Well, let's get into it. One of the

(06:13):
things that I think though, was interesting to point out
for this particular stores material. Again, we're talking about his story.
Dough Ray me as in the First Notes of the
Musical Scale, published in nineteen fifty five in the Atlantic
and that was developed into The Girl Can't Help It.

(06:33):
And interestingly, Garson Caanan was himself a musician in his youth.
He was a saxophone player and he had a group
called wait were they called? Not the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Speaker 5 (06:46):
Garson Canaan, Oh I just had and his Red Hot Peppers.
Canaan and his Red Hot Peppers.

Speaker 4 (06:53):
Whatcha So let's talk about Garson Canaan, Ruth Gordon and
that whole scene.

Speaker 5 (06:59):
Oh my goodness. So he was born in Rochester, New York,
nineteen twelve. He was raised in Brooklyn, went to James
Madison High School. He studied at the American Academy of
Dramatic Arts because he was going to start an acting career,
but he instead he started writing on the side. He
met his wife, Ruth Gordon, his first wife, Ruth Gordon.

(07:20):
They were married in nineteen forty two and they were
together until her death in nineteen eighty five, and they
wrote many scripts together. They wrote with Katherine Hepburn, Spencer, Tracy.
What am I thinking of?

Speaker 4 (07:36):
Adams? Rib and Pat and Mike those are the two
that people know the most.

Speaker 5 (07:39):
Thank you. I mean he also He wrote the play
for Born Yesterday. He also he directed the Darya van
Frank on Broadway in nineteen fifty five. He also directed
the musical Funny Girl in nineteen sixty four. He's a
part of the American Theater Hall of Fame. So he
was a writer and an actor. And this was a
short story, as Margo said that he wrote called do

(08:01):
ray Me. It was an Atlantic magazine. We did post
it in our Facebook group, and I think we also
posted it in a patroon which you could get for free.
And it's we I had a hard time reading this story.
I mean he's writing, first of all, he's writing in
a cadence of a man that he just got out
of jail and he was in prison and he met
somebody in prison, and he sort of talks like it's

(08:23):
nineteen fifty five. He's talking like a nineteen fifty five
thug that a movie or slang, and the cadence and
there and all that stuff. So it's and it was
hard to read, first of all, physically, just whoever scanned
it for the Atlantic magazine.

Speaker 4 (08:38):
It didn't didn't do it great. Whatever the state of
Ai was when they scanned it was not not great, So.

Speaker 5 (08:44):
It was a little challenging to read and also just
the wording of it, but it is. It's a short story,
and it's about a man who met another person and
another man in jail, and they were talking about how
when they got out of jail, what's a place where
you can make money? And it's the record business. And
I never told you this story, Margo. My uncle, my godfather,

(09:07):
he ran he had his own record company in Long
Island and he produced two of Billy Joel's records. One
of them is Turnstiles, which is one of his. Yeah,
I know, I met Billy Joel when I was a kid,
before he became like super famous. I was really little.
But he ran this in Garden City, Long Island, and
the mob found out about it, and the mob tried

(09:30):
to buy him out, and he really didn't want to sell,
but the mob they found out that his daughter, my
cousin Terry, was diabetic, and somebody called one day and
said she would be real shame if she didn't get
the right medicine one day, and my uncle quickly sold
his business and got out of the record business. Yeah,
this was in the seventies, and he'd heard that it

(09:53):
was pretty mobbed up, you know, in certain aspects certain times,
and in the fifties especially, and you heard about there
were payola scandals. There were disc jockeys that were paid
all kinds of money to promote some records over other records.
If you ever wondered in your life, how come this
never became a hit song? Sometimes it's because it's if
it's just a small record label and they don't have
great people working on it, or they don't often have people.

(10:15):
But sometimes at a big label, sometimes there's a person
there that they have a shine for and they promised
that they were going to do promotion for. And we've
all heard songs that were like, this is a terrible record,
Why do they keep playing this? And sometimes it's because,
you know, there's anyway in the fifties there was this
pay There were paola scandals, and there were certain DJs

(10:35):
that actually was a huge scandal. They were very popular
and some of them wound up getting in a lot
of trouble for taking money from the mop The mob
Blake also took over record contracts. I mean, there's all
kinds of stories about motown and artists that never got
their royalties, especially in the fifties and the sixties, like
they really it's it's a business that all of a
sudden rock and roll hit and all of a sudden

(10:58):
record you know, having a forty five having an album.
You know, it got cheaper to own these things, and kids,
so lots of kids had these records and then they
became a business. It's like for CDs for us when
we were young, Yeah, everybody had a you know, had
a CD collection because it was pretty inexpensive, and so
there was a lot of money and it's not easy

(11:20):
to keep track of it all. And so there is
the nefarious kinds of people that can get involved in
a thing that's a lot like once again, a lot
of money happening very quickly and with young people involved
and all that good stuff.

Speaker 4 (11:34):
The other thing I want to say is, like you
mentioned Born Yesterday, I felt reading this that this is
that the story was I don't want to say capitalizing
on Born Yesterday, but it's very much in the same
vein as Born Yesterday. So just to remind everybody, or
if you've never seen Born Yesterday, the plot of Born

(11:57):
Yesterday is that this gangster is getting involved in politics.
He's moved to Washington, DC, and he's got uh, he's
got a politician that he owns basically, who's on like
a strategic committee that's going to make the gangster a
lot of money. It's nothing that could ever possibly happen today,

(12:18):
of course.

Speaker 5 (12:19):
But oh yeah, YoY.

Speaker 4 (12:22):
But the gangster has a girlfriend, a beautiful girlfriend, people
like Julie Holliday, both on stage and on the screen.
And again, if you've never seen Born Yesterday, just stop this,
go watch that and then come back. So Judy Holliday's
character is very rough around the edges. She don't talk
too good. And so the mobster hires this reporter, a

(12:47):
writer because he's college he's a college boy, to teach
his girlfriend how to be more you know, more educated,
more about things the way they work in Washington, and
be able to fit in more with societ. They're a
little bit of a my fair Lady kind of a story.
And then of course the the girlfriend and the reporter

(13:07):
fall in love and it's but it is about politics
and corruption and class is there's a lot of really
amazing themes that they're that they're using in this, in
that plot that, and they're delivering them to you with
this funny, snappy dialogue and these fun moments, it does

(13:29):
go very dark. There's always this kind of undertone of
violence that's that's there, which give it a real nice
grounding anyway. So that's that's the plot of Born Yesterday.
The plot of Dora Me So so Born Yesterday is
in the forties. The play and then the movie is
in the early fifties. This story Dora me is published

(13:51):
in The Atlantic in nineteen fifty five, and as Margo
said that, we once again have a mobster who is
trying to buy influence. In this case, it's in the
it's in the music industry, not in politics. And he
tries to control, you know, he tries to control the
jukebox distribution game. He tries to control like all the

(14:16):
different parts of it so that he's making money in
every possible juncture of the process of producing a record basically.
And he has this guy and he's in jail that
our narrator is in jail at the beginning. He's taken
the fall for this gangster that doesn't happen in the
movie at all, and he's relating what happened to his cellmate.

(14:41):
So the gangster, so they're thinking like we can you know,
it's rock and roll basically, and it's also poking fun
at rock and roll, like, well, just anybody and you
don't have to have talent, you just have to be
jumping up and down and yelling. And so they're like, yeah,
we can make anybody a star. And so in the story,
they they are writing an elevator and they see this

(15:05):
beautiful elevator operator and I think she's she's humming or
singing or something. You know, she's just like coming to
herself as she's operating the elevator up and down, and
they hire her. Right, They're like, kid, we're gonna make
you a star. Get out of this. Literally drag her
out of the elevator. And so then they work on

(15:26):
making this woman a star, and she does become a
mega global superstar. And in the process of the in
the course of the story, also the the mobster at
one point is singing he he has she can't be
there for some reason, and he jumps in and fills

(15:47):
in for her, and then he becomes a singing star
as well. And then I forget exactly what the machinations
are that the that the agent guy ends up taking
the fall for the for the mobster, but he does,
and so so at the end of it all, the
agent has been who'd been duped and dragged into the
whole thing. He's in jail doing the time, while the

(16:08):
mobster and the elevator operator are enjoying fame and fortune
as rock and roll stars. The end. And that's the story,
and it's very fun. Garson Kanan is a brilliant writer.
What can you say, it's Garson Kanan. Of course it's
going to be great. Unfortunately, like Simaro said, like the
scanning thing is a little a little hard to deal with.

(16:30):
We both are very experienced at reading and historical records
that where that's the case. And also it doesn't help
that it's written in a dialect, a mid century New
York City criminal underworld dialect on top of everything else.
So it does make it a little bit of a
tough ree for a novice. But we are going to

(16:51):
put this. The story is in our Facebook group. If
you want to take a crack at it, it's there.
And so I don't know what the impetus was for development,
because it's a little while later that this movie comes out, right.

Speaker 5 (17:06):
Well, the movie comes out in fifty six. Actually the
movie comes out pretty quickly, but long after. There was
also a musical Do Rey Me that came out in
nineteen sixty and I think maybe Garson Kanan probably had
more control over that than this. I don't know. Yeah,
but as you were telling me just before we started
the show that Garson Kanaan was not happy when with

(17:28):
the direction. We should say, mid fifties, we have Elvis.
You know, America is going through this prosperity. It's the yes,
you know, it's a postwar boom, the post war boom.
The baby boomers are now young teenagers. They're hepcats or whatever.
They're getting Bobby socks and they're listening to Elvis, and
they're watching the shows on the dance shows on the

(17:50):
TV those who have a TV. And you know, it's
a big deal about this movie is that they wanted
Elvis for this, by the way, and the colonel of
course said no, that's not enough money for Elvis, because
the Colonel cor man Elvis. He was problematic, but he
also was a victim of a really rock in very
many ways. Yeah, from this Schuster. So they they have

(18:13):
people the movie that we have and it's directed by
somebody who also he directed cartoons. He it's in addition,
and they asked him, like, you know, when he was
directing this movie, like, how did you find the comedy?
He goes, I think big boobs are really funny. It's
it's okay, you know. But they so they they have

(18:35):
this cast where Jane Mansfield. By the way, if you've
seen the doc if you haven't seen the documentary on HBO,
it's the Muska hargates My Mom Jane. It's wonderful. It
will I've never really had a thought about Jane Mansfield.
I just kind of knew the salacious stuff about her,
and I'd never seen this movie before. I never seen

(18:57):
anything with her in it before. I know MS, I've
seen SVU a million times. But once I saw that,
I was like, I have so much more of appreciation
for this woman. First of all, just how intelligent she
was in real life and how hard working she was,
you know, with her career. I mean, she a single
mom from Texas like she was ninety.

Speaker 4 (19:17):
She's already a single mom. I saw. I didn't watch
the I didn't watch all of it. I haven't seen
all of the My Mom Jane. Is that what it's
called my mom. Yes, and I know that's why I
was like, I don't want to be sad, so I
would also recommend.

Speaker 3 (19:34):
Uh.

Speaker 4 (19:35):
There was a there's a really great review a pretty
recently came out of my mom Jane talking about Jane
Jane Mansfield by the drag queen James Mansfield, who I adore,
who's so talented as well a puppeteer, fierce drag queen
and a really good historian.

Speaker 5 (19:55):
Actually, when did you talk to I talked to a
drag queen last week?

Speaker 3 (19:58):
Oh?

Speaker 5 (19:58):
Really, Jackie Beat, who I'm writing a book about. You
talked to Jackie talked to Jackie Beat What wait? Wait
what I know? I have a friend who knows him her.
Uh yeah, wow. I'm writing a book about all the
different carry movies. And Jackie Bead is a very famous.

Speaker 4 (20:16):
Obsessed with carrieous as Carrie.

Speaker 5 (20:18):
So I had it, yes, and he showed me he
had a zoom call and he showed me all around
the house and he says, when I come out to
La we'll hang out.

Speaker 3 (20:25):
I know.

Speaker 4 (20:26):
Yeah, Jackie Bead has like a whole carry room. I know.
I cannot believe that.

Speaker 5 (20:29):
No, I know how we're talking about so much of
this show today.

Speaker 4 (20:34):
So James Mansfield is based in not Los Angeles, in
Las Vegas, really big in the Las Vegas scene. It
actually comes from I think I think she's from Wisconsin. Originally,
she and Trixie Mattell started kind of in the same place.
And anyway, James Nancyel is a really really devoted drag

(20:55):
historian and does a lot of history pieces about influential
bombshells of the screen. And of course she's called James
Mansfield j A Y M. E. S. So you can
guess who her favorite is. And so she did a
really great review not only of the Muska Hargita documentary,

(21:16):
but because she's read all the books and seen all
the documentary, she's like, Okay, you're really gonna want to
watch this one. This one's trash. Don't watch that, read
this book, don't read that book. So I watched one
of the documentaries that she recommended that was done by
the BBC, and that was actually really good. They talked
to they talked to her. Now is her first husband

(21:39):
in Mariska Hargatea's thing at all?

Speaker 5 (21:42):
No, mister Mansfield, No, No, they don't have mister Mansfield.

Speaker 4 (21:45):
Okay, So mister Mansfield was in the one that I watched,
and he's.

Speaker 5 (21:49):
Just like a normal Guy's just.

Speaker 4 (21:51):
Like a normal guy.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
You know.

Speaker 4 (21:53):
They were kids and she wanted to be a movie
star and so you know he kind of it was
like okay, but like didn't really know what that was.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
You know.

Speaker 4 (22:05):
She's super brilliant. Yeah, put herself through college with a baby,
you know, and just at a time when women didn't
go to college at all.

Speaker 5 (22:14):
She spoke four languages. She was an excell the violin,
violin and piano and played them excellently like she can't. Yes,
she was. She put on this character of the Blonde Bombshell,
which is the other the same as Marilyn Monroe. And
there were blonde bombshells before them, but this is you know,
specific to mid nineteen fifties, so we have rock and

(22:34):
roll as starting to take off and the music business
being what it is and America being what it is.
It's this movie is incredible because I did some research
about bands like the Beatles bonded over this movie, John
Lennon and Paul McCarty.

Speaker 4 (22:47):
It was a huge watershed moment for a lot of
people who were influential in the culture. Later on John Waters, right,
there's a great interview with John Waters about this movie
and how influence it was on There is this hilarious
he did this, He shot it in the It must

(23:08):
have been in the seventies or maybe even the sixties,
maybe the seventies of Divine, Oh right, Divine doing that
walk through Baltimore, like can't help it, the girl can't
help it. Only it's like all run down and like
graffiti and trash everywhere, but there's Divine like can't help

(23:28):
it all like walking around. It's so great. So, yeah,
a lot of people and I can see why. Yeah,
you know the it's first of all, it's so funny.
It's I don't know what. Garcon Canaan for some reason
was really not happy with the changes that they made,
although they're not a lot of changes. No, and he

(23:49):
had his he said, like take my name off the picture,
so his name is not is not really associated with
the film. He didn't really talk about I couldn't find
anything of him talking about the movie. But it's as
we just saw in the trailer. It's shot what the
intro the intro, Sorry, it's not the trailer it's the intro.

(24:13):
It's shot in CinemaScope. It's in amazingly gorgeous spectrum color
whatever that kind of color that they used in that one.
The costumes. The costumes are by.

Speaker 2 (24:28):
What is your name?

Speaker 4 (24:29):
Here? We are your name is dang it Ah. It
starts with an am. I think he's the same fellow
who did the costumes for All About Eve, How to
Marry a Millionaire? How to marry a millionaire? Gentlemen prefer blondes,
And this is like just a step, a step farther

(24:52):
down that road, right, so feels so bad at forgetting
your name. It starts with an M, and he's he
had a super long career. But the costumes are fit spectacular,
the lighting is spectacular, and the use of like one
of the things I think is so cool about this
film is you have and this is true. They took

(25:16):
this out of the story that the the mobster writes
a song for the starlet to sing, right, And in
this case it's a parody of Rock around the Clock
called what's it called?

Speaker 6 (25:27):
Rock around the Oh the rock pile, Rock around the
roy Pile, Yes, Rock around the Rock Pile, which I
think Paul McCartney memorized when he was auditions to the Beatles,
I mean hilarious.

Speaker 4 (25:39):
Yeah, So they could have and it's very clever and
it's very well produced that song. They could have easily
had all kinds of phony acts for doing all kinds
of songs that they'd written just for the film. They
could have done that. And maybe they maybe because it
was a musical, maybe they had a bunch of songs.
I don't know. I don't I couldn't find out a

(26:00):
lot about the musical. But what they do instead is
bring in all these actual hit musical acts of the
day performing their hit songs, and they have white artists
and black artists perform me and there's no.

Speaker 5 (26:20):
Segregation.

Speaker 4 (26:21):
They're completely presented on totally equal footing.

Speaker 5 (26:25):
Which is one of the reasons why. Like it was
also Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page from The Yardbirds and
led Zeppelin, like they talked about like this movie blew
their minds because you have Eddie Cochrane and you have
little Richard who's just I mean so great. Uh, Julie London.

Speaker 4 (26:42):
It seems nervous.

Speaker 5 (26:44):
Yeah, he's holding back a little bit.

Speaker 4 (26:46):
He's holding back a little bit, Like he doesn't.

Speaker 5 (26:50):
Because I would terrify people.

Speaker 4 (26:52):
But it's still super good.

Speaker 5 (26:54):
Is Eddie Cochran and gene Vincent be Bappolula? I mean,
Fat's Domino is he?

Speaker 4 (26:59):
I remember? Is so good? That's Domino is it?

Speaker 5 (27:01):
I mean it's like and then super talented people.

Speaker 4 (27:05):
It's just and then some of these acts that I
don't really know about, like the Trennieres rockin is our Business?
They were that that number is so good. They're they're
a jump blues group, and that they are so well coordinated,
and the choreography that they have and the musicianship that
they have, and I'm not really familiar with their work,

(27:28):
but but I know them from here. We have what
is your name? Abby Lincoln? Yes, her number spread the word.
I mean, they're just some gorgeous numbers. The way that
they're produced in the costume, it was, in the lighting
and it and it's a lot of acts that they bring.

(27:51):
I mean, I'm saying nineteen songs, yeah, and each one
is by a different artist, and.

Speaker 5 (28:00):
And they get a decent amount of time with each one.

Speaker 4 (28:03):
Yeah, it's not like an abbreviate. It's a full song.
It's a full song for each one. So a lot
of this film is the music. And yet it doesn't
feel like a jukebox musical. It doesn't feel like it's
crammed in there. It just is like, Oh, he's gonna
go because he's a music agent. He goes and sees

(28:24):
all these different acts. Ohverreat he's taking her around to
these different clubs, and these are the acts that are
Little Richard is playing at that nightclub for an all
white crowd. But he's playing and nobody, you know, nobody's
saying it. There's a lot of there's at least let's
see one, two, three, four of there's like a half

(28:44):
a dozen numbers by black artists performing their own work.
They did not bring in Pat Boone to do those songs, right,
They brought in Little Richard to do those songs because
they're his songs. But yeah, it's just and and also
you see like it's a really important time in music
where we're moving out of that kind of big band

(29:06):
pop uh songs of the forties. We're not quite into
the rock and roll of the sixties, but we have
blues and stuff and it's all kind of starting to
bubble in the cauldron. And we're seeing all of these
different acts that were influential in what came What came next?
Plus Jane Mansfield.

Speaker 5 (29:26):
Should we start with the trailer and then yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:29):
Let's play this trailer. It's okay, hold on.

Speaker 7 (29:39):
It.

Speaker 5 (29:47):
My block all black hates.

Speaker 4 (29:57):
A few phone please, Yeah of it? Okay, o me
sees God a bigger.

Speaker 2 (30:04):
Maid of it.

Speaker 3 (30:07):
You'll rock and roll yourself to the happiest time of
your life with a sensational and array of stars as
the screen has ever assembled to delight you. That seven
year rich fellow Tom Mule seven million times itchier than before.

Speaker 4 (30:25):
Oh, I've been in men's bedrooms before.

Speaker 3 (30:28):
And man, oh man, oh Man's field. Jane Mansfield, that
is the terrific star of rock Hunter in her first
rocking role on the screen.

Speaker 8 (30:38):
But everyone figures me for a sex pot.

Speaker 6 (30:42):
No one thinks I'm equipped from motherhood.

Speaker 3 (30:45):
And Edmund O'Brien as the big shot who has big
ideas for Jane.

Speaker 1 (30:50):
You got six weeks to have her a star, you
know the first thing? Six weeks? Oh easy, fats, it
takes time. Rome wasn't built in a day, she ain't rown.
What we're talking about is already built.

Speaker 3 (31:04):
All of this plus the greatest headline entertainers of the.

Speaker 4 (31:08):
Day cry.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
Rock, Rock, Rock, round rock, bob.

Speaker 4 (31:16):
Step, lobbs, wait.

Speaker 8 (31:19):
New Monday, Ah, he's new mondays.

Speaker 3 (31:23):
Rock It is out says rock.

Speaker 8 (31:25):
It is what we do.

Speaker 3 (31:26):
Oh yeah, knock it is out there, and I'm it.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Is what we do.

Speaker 3 (31:31):
Oh yeah, come off, everybody, we rock. You don't now
we've got down as jim Me on Rock, Jimmy one
on Bada, Bill Cleve and God and sing this chime
on everybody get to join the line. Lock is Op
says it is.

Speaker 5 (31:51):
What me.

Speaker 3 (31:54):
When this living doll takes off after the guy with
the inch, you'll have yourself a ball at the rock
is rowing as roaring as shin dig that ever made
the screen jump with joy.

Speaker 8 (32:07):
A sim a phone man.

Speaker 4 (32:17):
O man O Manfield. Aren't you dying to see that film?
I absolutely so exciting. We don't talk. We talked about
Tom Yule, of course, when we talked about The Seven
Year Inch, which is based on a play. Uh. I

(32:37):
kind of even like him better in this, I think
than I.

Speaker 5 (32:39):
Do in that. Yeah, I think he's more relatable here
because in the Seven Years he's a married man like
flirting front of a creep. Yeah, yeah, a creep I
mean here, he's he's he's been through some things. I mean,
and also she's been through something.

Speaker 4 (32:52):
I would say.

Speaker 5 (32:52):
Jane Mansfield is hilarious in this movie.

Speaker 4 (32:55):
She is. She is so funny, her timing is perfect.
She has just like I'm gonna say it, just like
Judie Holliday in Born Yesterday, Like she has has dimension
to her character. She's not an airhead. She has you

(33:16):
really believe like when she talks about her family and
her childhood, and and she really brings a lot of
depth to a character that's not written very deep. And
we don't have the same we don't have quite the
same undertone of menace that we have in Born Yesterday.

(33:37):
It's it's a little frothier, it's bubblier, but it's still
making a statement about, uh, the way that we judge people,
you know. It's I just think it's so interesting that
we have They're going to see these black and white artists.
Nobody is talking about one being better or lesser than
the other. But she's getting judged all over for the place.

(34:01):
Everybody is assuming she's a star just because of what
she looks like. They don't ever even ask her to
open her mouth, but they're going to make her a
singing star. And yeah, and Tom mule is an is
a is a well, he has a very serious drinking problem.

Speaker 5 (34:17):
He's yeah, he's a bit of a drinker. He's a
pr agent. And he was married or.

Speaker 4 (34:23):
He he was he had he had a love affair
with one of my favorite singers of all time, Julie London,
who could not look more beautiful. She sings her hit song,
Crime a River, which is my favorite song of crime,
my favorite version of crimea River, absolutely, bar none. Ever.
She sings it with about seventeen costume changes in this film,

(34:45):
and each one is more jaw dropping than the last.
Julie London, Julie London, I grew up loving I loved
her as a little girl before I even knew that
she was a singer, because I adored her on the
T television show Emergency, where she played Nurse Dixie McCall.

Speaker 5 (35:03):
Okay, that's who, Okay, that's who she was.

Speaker 4 (35:05):
Okay, so she was. She was the toughest nails head
nurse of Rampart Hospital. Nurse Dixie McCall and doctor Joe
Early was played by Bobby Troop, and Bobby Troop was Okay,
So Julie London. When Julie London made this movie Girl
Can't Help It, and she'd had a hit record. She

(35:26):
this was already a record that she had made, but this,
this movie made it a hit again and made it
a bigger hit than it had originally been. She was
encouraged to do. She knew Bobby Troop and he was
the one who was like, you know, you really should
record this song. And the songwriter was somebody that she
had gone to high school with but at the time
that she recorded it and is in this movie. And

(35:47):
Bobby Troop, by the way, is they also the guy
who wrote gret Can't help It. The Girl Can't help It.
That's his song as well. He also wrote Root sixty
six oh and a bunch of other songs that you
know but you And when she's making this film, is
married to Jack Webb of Dragnet fame.

Speaker 5 (36:07):
Jack web Yes, and.

Speaker 4 (36:09):
They had two children, and Jack Webb was a great,
big jazz music fan and he he really was into
that whole scene. So when Jack Webb and Julie London divorced,
they split up. She marries Bobby Troop, and years later,

(36:30):
when Jack Webb is producing a new television show called Emergency,
and he wants his ex wife and mother of his children,
Julie London, to play nurse Dixie McCall. She said, well, yeah,
but can you get a part from Bobby too, So
Bobby Troop plays doctor Joe Early and so and her

(36:50):
husband are on this show that's produced by her ex husband.
So apparently they were all very still stayed very friendly
nice after all of that, which is really cool. So
Bobby Troup is like a really infla Winchell song writer,
and and I kind of see his touches all over this,
although he's not credited all over this, but I feel
like I could hear a lot of his kind of

(37:11):
arrangement in a in some of these numbers and the
way that they're the way that they're produced for this film,
but especially in crimea River. He you know, he's, he's
You could kind of hear his his voice in that.
But I love the song, can't help it. I think
it's such a great song, and I think Little Richard

(37:31):
like and they could have easily had Bobby True performing it,
but no, they give it to Little Richard to do.

Speaker 5 (37:36):
And Little Richard, I don't know if you there was
a documentary about him out like a year or two
ago that was That'sreulan.

Speaker 4 (37:42):
Yeah, that was a good one.

Speaker 5 (37:43):
And my friend's dad was a huge Little Richard fan.
And I was very young when he made a tape
for cassette tape for me, like of the greatest hits
of Little Richard. So, I mean, Little Richard was amazing
and he was a maniac when he was singing. I
mean he but he influenced Elvis. He influenced everybody. I
mean they were the Beatles, the Beatles, absolutely, they were

(38:04):
obsessed with him in the UK. I mean he was
just everything. Like if you hear about America.

Speaker 4 (38:11):
When you hear early Beatles like she Loves You when
they do that, ooh, that's Little Richard. They're they're doing
Little Richard.

Speaker 5 (38:21):
So John when he's like leaping off the piano.

Speaker 4 (38:23):
Oh yeah, him too. Hugely influential, and their first exposure,
some of them for seeing him was this film. And
he was on this movie because I think he has
three numbers. I think he has like he's several numbers.
But also like this is there's no Soul Train, there's
no American Bandstand yet there's going to be you don't

(38:44):
have places where you can see them.

Speaker 5 (38:45):
There's no MTV or there's no place to see videos
like it was a big deal. Like Paul McCartney said,
it was in nineteen sixty eight when they were recording
the White album. They were in the middle of recording
the song Birthday and they had to stop because Linda
called and said, your movie's coming on. It's gonna be
on in England. And it was like the first time

(39:06):
was gonna be on England. The girl can't help it.
So the Beatles left the studio Abbey Road to watch
this well to get inspired. But that's what got them
inspired too, because this is what they loved. You can
see why it's such great. I'm like, I must have
been thrilling. You know all of these numbers in nineteen
fifty six or seven and you're watching this movie. You

(39:26):
must have been like, this is so inspiring.

Speaker 4 (39:29):
Little Richard of Courses as we were just saying, like
he he's kind of restrained. I mean, I would have
given anything to have seen him live in those days.
But and that's a lot of that is because he's
he he's black. Of course. However, gene Vincent it's giving

(39:49):
us a very sexy be Bappolula.

Speaker 5 (39:52):
He's whoa, he's working it.

Speaker 4 (39:54):
Wow.

Speaker 5 (39:55):
Yeah, yeah, I was thinking things. I was like, I
bet some girls were like whoo, this is like you know,
it must have killed Elvis to not be in this movie.

Speaker 4 (40:05):
If what do you see all the other and fat
Stay all these ads Domino, That's wonderful, It's it's it's great,
Like can we can we play a clip of Jane
walking because it's just this is like shame famous, this
is the this is the secrets that I was just
telling you that John Waters is inspired by. I should

(40:30):
have found that clip. I'll put that clip. I'll find
it and I'll put it in our basement group. It's
so funny. But this is such a famous scene. And
John Waters in that interview I was talking about He's
talking like these are like, I mean, it's porn. These

(40:51):
are just these are these are sex jokes, sex gags,
over and over and over ahead and nobody's like, nobody's
freaking out. I don't I couldn't find.

Speaker 5 (41:07):
Yes, I mean, it's like so like I think it's
a little tit. I even kind of got like this.

Speaker 4 (41:14):
Can you not how can you not okay, let's so
let's take a look at it. Iconic sequence of just
Jane Mansfield walking. That's all yeat you mores, get your
model bags, get you more on paper man, No, thanks, Sonny.

Speaker 6 (41:36):
Can you tell me where I can find three?

Speaker 4 (41:38):
Five one? Wait, forty one second branch man.

Speaker 8 (41:41):
Thanks, honey.

Speaker 4 (42:00):
She got a lot what they call the mom.

Speaker 1 (42:05):
The god can't heaven?

Speaker 2 (42:06):
She a ball, she got a bigger maid squeezy.

Speaker 4 (42:14):
Can't help it, okay, help it a lot to kind.

Speaker 2 (42:17):
Of bee aware the girl kat Heaven.

Speaker 4 (42:24):
I mean.

Speaker 5 (42:30):
What, she's her own special effect.

Speaker 4 (42:35):
I've just I have always been obsessed with her. I
just think she's so underrated, and it's it's unfortunate because
you have you know, it just shows you about like
women in Hollywood. You know, you we can only have
one blonde apparently, like we can only have one, you know,
we can only have one this, we can only have

(42:57):
one that, we can only have one Kate hat Burne,
who's like this your actress, you know, we can only
have and she's okay, yeah, she's blonde and she's busty,
but she's not Marilyn Monroe. She's a completely different. It's
a totally different. If you look beyond that, it's not

(43:20):
the same at all. It's not the same at all.
And it's that's really it sucks for both of them
that they got pigeonholed this way. All the blondes, you know,
you can have more than one blonde name Van Doren.
I mean that all of that crowd of blondes, each
one of them is their own person. And and even now,
like we so rarely let them just be their own person.

(43:44):
I think this is such a great performance by Jane Mansfield.
It's so funny, it's so you really feel for her.
She's you actually really feel for her character.

Speaker 5 (43:56):
Yeah, she doesn't want to be a singing star, like
you know, she's not even dating this guy. But like
so we should say Edmund O'Brien, is that who that is?
He's plays Fats. He's plays Fats. He's we talked about
when we talked about The Killers. He's very funny, but
he's he's infatuated with her and he thinks like if
he gets her to be a big star, she'll be
like his girlfriend, wife or whatever, and so she's just

(44:20):
sort of playing him along. Yeah, he says he wants
to marry her, but she can't marry her. He wants
to be married to with somebody that's right. That's why
he goes through all the matt He's insecure, so he
doesn't want to marry her while she's a nobody. He
wants to make her into a somebody worthy of him
marrying her. But he also has down in there.

Speaker 4 (44:40):
Unlike the character in Born Yesterday, right like down deep down,
he is a violent monster, right, a murderer. This guy
like deep down, he does have a heart, and he
ultimately wants her to in the end, he ultimately wants
her to be happy. And but tomm Yule is so
fun I mean, he's such a I'm gonna say, I'm

(45:06):
very impressed by his dancing.

Speaker 5 (45:08):
He was good.

Speaker 4 (45:09):
Yeah, we're good dancer.

Speaker 5 (45:11):
Yeah, he had some movies.

Speaker 4 (45:12):
It's being funny. I mean, it's comedic dancing. But it's
so well executed.

Speaker 5 (45:17):
We had a couple of people mentioned in the Facebook
group she had just done this has success killed rock Hunter.

Speaker 4 (45:23):
A success spoiled rock Hunter. Y.

Speaker 5 (45:25):
Yeah, so she was like a big star in Broadway,
so this was like her next big chance. So this
was the movie that was going to come out of Christmas.
In fifty six she plays So she's this gorgeous woman
and Fats wants her to be a star, and so
he hires this publicist to try to make her a star.
And so he's doing the things that you do. You
take her to the nightclubs and you make sure that
everybody sees her and everybody wants her, and throughout the

(45:48):
story they start to fall in love. But sometimes it's
like it's a ploy in the movie, but in this one,
I kind of believe it, Like I kind of believe
that she sees the sweeter person in him, Like he's
think he is a nicer guy than he is than
in seven Year Itch. He's more relatable. You know, he
drinks too much, he's got he's he has a sadness
about him that she can detect. Right.

Speaker 4 (46:09):
The idea is that he had his we forgot to
circle back to because I got all excited about Julie
London the in the story, he had been the representative
of Julie London. And so the reason that Fats hires
him or he pays off, Oh, he also has gambling
debts Tom Mule's character, so Fats is like, listen, I'll

(46:31):
pay off your gambling debts, but you're going to make
my girlfriend a star. And the reason that he does
this is because Tom Mule's character is famous for not
making a pass at his female artist that he represents,
so he's had some integrity. But that integrity got him

(46:52):
broken hearted because he actually had fallen in love with
Julie London while he was representing her, and she she
was falling for him, but he was like, no, you know,
we have to keep it business like. And so she
breaks his heart or he breaks his own heart, and
she goes off and becomes a huge star. So that's
that's what the whole like Julie London thing is. And

(47:14):
he's famous also for making Julie London famous in this story,
so so that's why. So he has he has a
lot of integrity that he doesn't have in the seven
year Itch and the seven year Ish the whole time
you're like, uh, yeah, he just shipped off his wife
and kids, so he could be knitting on her. Yeah
that's not the case here. So yeah, they really and
they really have wonderful chemistry too. Well.

Speaker 5 (47:37):
She and she she's from wherever she's from, but she
has like seven brothers and she loves to cook, and
she actually just wants to get married and have babies,
and you really believe it when she talks about it,
like you really believe like this is what she dreams of.
She loves to cook for him, she likes to take
care of him, and she recognizes that he drinks too much,
and she recognizes that he's a little lonesome, and so

(47:58):
she's trying to draw him him out and he's trying
to keep it professional, and so he takes her around
New York. She does get to saying ish on one
of the tracks, which is funny, which just kind of
makes a wacky noise. But you know, let's know, we
can't talk forever about this movie. But they do fall

(48:18):
in love and she eventually she fats does let her go,
which is actually a really sweet part of it. And
in the end they get married. And what's what's great
is that the wedding gown that she wears in this movie,
Wedding Beautiful, she wears when she marries Mickey hargatea like
two years later, they lender the They lend her the.

Speaker 4 (48:40):
The whole time I'm watching this film, because again, the
costumes our next level just like that. You could watch
this for the costumes alone, but but the fact that
everything else is so good is just icing on the
cake the whole time. Like I'm watching Julie Lindon, I'm like,
she better have gotten to keep all these gowns, and
like Jane Mansfield better have gotten to keep every single
one of these outfits. And that that wedding gown is

(49:02):
like it's like painted on, it's so so beautiful. So yeah,
they get married, they live happily ever after, and they
have like whatever it is, five kids who are all
the same age somehow and all blonde. And they're all
all blonde.

Speaker 5 (49:16):
Yeah we have Let's let's play the clip of It's
with Eddie Cochrane so it shows, uh, such a.

Speaker 4 (49:23):
I just it's just is just an example of the many, many,
many outstanding musical performances in this film. But let's like
a look at Eddie cochran.

Speaker 3 (49:34):
Way up bed while we walked, and what's the matter.

Speaker 1 (49:38):
Right on channel two?

Speaker 8 (49:39):
That's the matter.

Speaker 1 (49:44):
What does he want?

Speaker 3 (49:48):
Okay?

Speaker 1 (49:50):
Now, you and Milla watch watch it good, you honest.

Speaker 8 (49:55):
Watch it good, Yes, mister Manda.

Speaker 2 (49:57):
And don't hang up, I'll talk to you or as
he finishes his next number.

Speaker 1 (50:03):
We have to watch the television.

Speaker 8 (50:05):
Quiet, please, folks. He'll be back in just a moment.
Believe me, he'll be back in just a moment. This
Peter Potter, I've never let you down. He'll be back
in just a moment.

Speaker 5 (50:14):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (50:16):
And now we pause for a station. Identify Pats. It's
me Meller.

Speaker 8 (50:22):
What And now, folks, just like I promised you, here
he is back again. Eddie Cochran, one of America's top
rock and rollers.

Speaker 7 (50:34):
Eddie ooh Well, got to get over her in the
machine when it comes to rock, and she's queen. We
up to Vicos Saturday night, working four, hold a tide,
but you little on the food more uptown. The yellow
beats bokeing down, so I'll walk on five by six

(50:58):
seven Floyd blot move of all the wild fans going
on the dragon.

Speaker 4 (51:06):
We forgot to mention Janita Moore there. Yeah, she's playing
the maid and I love the dance that she does here.
Janita more famously played the mother in the nineteen fifty
nine remake of Imitation of Life, The one with Lana
Turner Lana Turner and Sandra d oh Yes and she's

(51:29):
I mean, it's very melodramatic and and all of she's
she's wonderful in that. She's so good in that movie,
and she's great in this, and she's also funny. I mean,
who knew she's can also do comedy. It's just watch
it and just watch it. It's it's a classic. We
don't talk about it enough. I feel like it's it's

(51:49):
so so good. It definitely belongs up there with gentlemen
preferred blonde. Yeah, definitely belongs up there with seven year Itch.
I think it's better than seven year Itch myself. And
just for the music alone.

Speaker 5 (52:01):
For the music, my god, I could not believe the
number of acts that were on this and how talented
and they let them play and it just they're all good.

Speaker 4 (52:09):
They're all great. There's not a single act that like
right here, the Fats the Mobster gets on is he's
talking about how like Eddie Cochran doesn't have a lot
of training and like basically he's kind of not very good,
but he's fantastic.

Speaker 5 (52:21):
The poor thing died young. Him and Gene Hitney, both
of them died very young. It's it's but you're capturing
I can see now why if you're a young beadle
or yardbird or whatever, if you look at this movie
and you would just be like, look look at these
acts and just be how excited about the music?

Speaker 4 (52:40):
You would go again and again. Ye see, just see
the musical acts. And considering that it takes up so
much of the film, you would think that you'd be like,
there's not a lot of story here, but there's there's
plenty of story.

Speaker 5 (52:51):
Yeah, it's it's yeah, and we saw I saw it.
It was on YouTube, it was free, it was easy
to get. Definitely check it out.

Speaker 4 (53:01):
Yeah, so yeah, love it.

Speaker 5 (53:04):
Movie book Chriss movie movie, Oh, definitely.

Speaker 4 (53:07):
Movie. Yeah. I don't know. Garson Kanaan was just like
a little grouchy that day or something. I don't know
what his deal was, but I mean it's a good idea.
It's a great idea for a story, and then look
it makes a spectacular film. So there.

Speaker 2 (53:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (53:20):
Movie.

Speaker 4 (53:21):
So let's talk about what we're doing next. We're uh,
are you ready for the truth? Y'all?

Speaker 5 (53:28):
We are? Can you handle the truth? I mean I
fled that we're gonna be covering a few good men.
If you're if you're wondering if you've seen the movie
a million times like I have, and you're like, wait,
that was based on a book. It was based on
a play, and a very popular play, and it's been
it's been remade a few times, so we're going to

(53:49):
cover that. I don't know why, but I just kind
of felt like middle of Summer. It's kind of a
very watchable movie, and I think there's gonna be just
a lot of lot to talk about. So we're really
excited about that.

Speaker 4 (53:59):
So join us. Be sure to like and subscribe if
you're watching us on YouTube, if you're following us you
know wherever, just yeah, just hit the little the little
subscribe and then you won't miss an episode. And we
really appreciate your joining us today and this very very
fun film. Now, Margot, where can people find you online?

Speaker 5 (54:16):
You can find me at Brooklynfitchick. I'm Brooklynfichick dot com.
I'm at Brooklynfichick for Threads and Instagram. I'm at Brooklyn
Margo for TikTok and Blue Sky, and my YouTube is
at my name Margo Donahue and Margo. Where can they
find you?

Speaker 4 (54:31):
You can find me online at coloniabook dot com and
all my social media callouts are at She's not cho Mama.

Speaker 5 (54:37):
All right, everyone, thank you so much for listening, and
please once again subscribe, and we'll be back soon with
another episode.

Speaker 2 (54:47):
A build up depends on the agent strategy. If I
were to go to the owner of the spot and
tell him I have a sensational performer, he has to
figure I'm ax grinding from my own ten percent. But
if I don't try to sell him he sees it,
he flips and he comes to me to check on her.

Speaker 8 (55:04):
I didn't see anybody slipping or checking.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
You will take your stole off and go to the powder.

Speaker 4 (55:10):
Room power room.

Speaker 2 (55:14):
Just visit a while. But on the way there and back,
walk by the reservation desk that's where the owner hangs
out on your way.

Speaker 4 (55:25):
Seems awfully silly, mister Miller.

Speaker 1 (55:30):
Operation powder room in operation. Yes, every day it's strolling
number down the way is so pretty.

Speaker 4 (55:36):
And this is what a thing?

Speaker 1 (55:37):
She got it?

Speaker 4 (55:40):
Got it?

Speaker 2 (55:46):
They at Black half Chet Cheating Northwest.

Speaker 5 (55:50):
She died. Thank you so much for listening to the
Book Versus Movie podcast. We're a part of the Speaker
podcast Network. Go to spreaker dot com to check out
all of the shows they offer. We asked that you
make sure to subscribe to our podcast, Book Vsmovie in

(56:13):
your podcast app, so that way you'll never miss an episode.

Speaker 4 (56:18):
If you want to interact with the.

Speaker 5 (56:19):
Margos, the best place to do that is in our
private Facebook group. Go to Facebook and type in book
Vsmovie podcast group and ask to join. On social media,
you can find us on Instagram and threads. You spell
out book versus and movie. Our email is book Versus
Movie Podcast spelled it out at gmail dot com. This

(56:41):
is Margo D. And you can find me at my
bo

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