MacMurray's Rescue

email this story
read comments (26)
post a comment

Let's hear it for the opening of the Fred MacMurray Museum in the Heritage Village Mall in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. It's opening partly to commemorate the fact that MacMurray, a Beaver Dam resident in his youth, was born 100 years ago. And because he was famous and well-liked for his quick smile, amiable nature and sure touch with comedies. But MacMurray's rep would be nothing if he hadn't played a couple of weak, selfish and gone-astray insurance guys in a pair of first-rate Billy Wilder films.

It was MacMurray's portrayal of Walter Neff, the insurance salesman who couldn't keep his mind off Phyllis Dietrichson's anklets, in Double Indemnity that rescued him from the amiable good-guy thing. He was saved again when he played Jeff Sheldrake, the selfish and manipulative chief of a New York insurance company in The Apartment. Without these two, news of the MacMurray Museum would be limited to local Wisconsin papers and T stations because people like me wouldn't care that much.

All MacMurray had on his resume otherwise was...okay, Keefer in The Caine Mutiny, but that film belong to Van Johnson and Jose Ferrer. But otherwise his resume was one light and amiable deal after another -- My Three Sons, the '60s TV series, and Bon Voyage, Follow Me, Boys!, The Absent-Minded Professor, The Egg and I, Trail of the Lonesome Pine, etc. Gimme a break.

Nobody's Perfect<< previous | next >>Snappy Argument

Posted by Jeffrey Wells on June 21, 2008 at 1:53 PM

comment #1

CinemaPhreek says ...

I remember sitting in a film noir class and the murmur of chuckles that went through the audience (this is the mid 80's) when in the middle of MacMurray's first tough guy, smack talking speech one of classmates muttered: "Boy, Steve Douglas is a bad ass."

Posted by CinemaPhreek at June 21, 2008 2:46 PM

comment #2

Arran says ...

His performance in The Apartment does make me wish he played more scumbags. He did it so brilliantly. Though would it have been as effective if he didn't also have the nice-guy reputation? Who knows.

Posted by Arran at June 21, 2008 2:53 PM

comment #3

Scott Feinberg says ...

I think you're forgetting that he did a nice job in "The Caine Mutiny" (1954), another fine film...

Posted by Scott Feinberg at June 21, 2008 3:15 PM

comment #4

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

Yeah, without Billy Wilder this'd be the John Payne Museum.

Wilder's story (probably exaggerated but rooted in reality) was that when he called him for The Apartment, MacMurray's response was something like "I got a good thing going with Disney, why do you want to screw it up by making me act again?"

Another good one, not from Disney, is A Good Day For a Hanging.

Posted by Mgmax, le Corbeau at June 21, 2008 3:20 PM

comment #5

Marty Melville says ...

I'm liking Fred MacMurray more and more as the years pass... and 1945's Murder, He Says (directed by George Marshall) is must-see... a black-comic screwball classic with a scared-stiff comedy turn from MacMurray worthy of Cary Grant and Bob Hope.

Posted by Marty Melville at June 21, 2008 3:49 PM

comment #6

Gaydos says ...

If old Fred had done NOTHING but Neff, I'd build him a frickin' museum. Neff's the ultimate All American schmo in love with/blinded by the wrong dame. El Numero Uno. Peerless. Who did it better?

Using my famed Gaydosian Theory of Essential vs Disposable, he gets an eternal candle for creating art I couldn't live without. (I won't list all the chaff that's been culled from my playlist on the other side of the ledger sheet.)

And if the folks back east can't build a little shrine for the old right-wing skinflint who survived decades of H'wood, worked with Vidor and WIlder and was a major Disney film star and then a big TV star, why rain on their parade? At least they're not out working for McCain while they're doing this.

In the words of Red Buttons, "Give him a dinner!"

Posted by Gaydos at June 21, 2008 4:04 PM

comment #7

George Prager says ...

I want a William Demarest museum.

Posted by George Prager at June 21, 2008 4:08 PM

comment #8

nemo says ...

I'm going to have to speak up for Fred MacMurray's forgotten career as a 1930s romantic comedy star. That's the main thing he was know for before Double Indemnity, and it was not a nothing career.

My wife got on a Fred MacMurray kick after seeing Double Indemnity and The Apartment, and tracked down some of his 30s romantic comedies. My first reaction was like everyone else's here -- oh, come on, these can't be any good. Everyone knows Fred was a lightweight and Billy Wilder made his career.

Well, I was wrong about at least a few of them. MacMurray's approach was far too laid back for his 30s romantic comedies to ever launch themselves into the manic stratosphere of the screwball comedies of the same period. And he's sure no Cary Grant (but who is?). But Fred was sure better than Henry Fonda at both romance and comedy.

The best of them by far is Honeymoon in Bali (sometimes billed as My Love for Yours) with Madeline Carroll. But good grief, the man starred in 4 -- count 'em, 4 -- romantic comedies with Carole Lombard at the height of her career.

When she wasn't busy making comedy classics like Twentieth Century, My Man Godfrey, and Nothing Sacred, Carole Lombard was starring in Hands Across the Table, The Princess Comes Across, Swing High, Swing Low, and True Confession with Fred MacMurray.

None of Lombard's pictures with MacMurray are top classics of the genre. But they are solid entertainment even today. And they blow out of the water virtually every romantic comedy made in the past decade or more. We just don't know how to make comedies like that anymore.

Posted by nemo at June 21, 2008 5:22 PM

comment #9

Gaydos says ...

God bless Nemo!

I didn't even mention the Mitchell Leisen/Carole Lombard stuff which, as you say, in this "Smart" weekend of crashing "Guru's," sets a standard for comedy that few in the biz today even want to acknowledge. Cos just like Jerry Lee's piano-playing, they ain't got the chops.

And I'm signing up for the board of the Bill Demarest Museum. "Defiitely the same dame!"

Posted by Gaydos at June 21, 2008 5:38 PM

comment #10

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

Good call on the Lombards, Nemo, especially Princess Comes Across which was a favorite of William K. Everson's. It and Hands Across the Table and True Confession are on that "Carole Lombard Glamour Collection" DVD which is probably at your local Costco for about $12, which is a steal for five pretty good movies. (Pick up the Marlene Dietrich one too, if for nothing else for the delightfully perverse The Devil is a Woman.)

Posted by Mgmax, le Corbeau at June 21, 2008 5:51 PM

comment #11

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

Incidentally, years ago (early 80s) a blonde chesty friend of mine worked a party that Fred went to (in Kansas City for some odd reason). She came home with a nice snapshot of aged Fred leering down her cleavage as if he still might have a little insurance fraud and husband-murder in him yet. She couldn't have been more delighted to have walked in the high heels of the movie gods.

Posted by Mgmax, le Corbeau at June 21, 2008 5:56 PM

comment #12

nemo says ...

I thought I was the film expert of our household, but I owe whatever I know about MacMurray's pre-Wilder movies to my wife's persistence. He may have played a weasel in his Wilder movies (and in the Caine Mutiny), but my wife thought he was one of the smoothest, most attractive weasels she'd ever seen in the movies, so she was determined to seek out his romantic comedies over my snobbish disdain.

That anklet on Barbara Stanwyck that did Fred in -- Billy Wilder used that again in Love in the Afternoon, when Audrey Hepburn decided she was going to sink her hooks into Gary Cooper. Cooper looked like he'd been smacked across the face when he saw that anklet.

Whatever became of anklets? I remember that even as late as the mid-60s when I was a kid they were considered sexy and daring in a trashy sort of way.

Posted by nemo at June 21, 2008 6:25 PM

comment #13

nemo says ...

I remember that when Samuel Jackson was cast for the remake of Shaft, some critic complained that Jackson was right for righteous action hero side of Shaft, but was completely wrong for the also important laid-back love daddy side of the character.

Well, in 1930s romantic comedies Fred MacMurray cornered the market when it came to playing laid-back love daddies.

Posted by nemo at June 21, 2008 6:32 PM

comment #14

lipranzer says ...

Another one of Fred MacMurray's great 30's and 40's comedies is REMEMBER THE NIGHT, directed by Leisen, written by Preston Sturges, and co-starring Barbara Stanwyck. While Sturges would skewer small towns so expertly in MIRACLE OF MORGAN'S CREEK and HAIL THE CONQUERING HERO, here, he writes the closest he ever came to an out-and-out Capra movie, and one set at Christmas to boot. Even if you don't like Christmas movies, you should definitely check out this charmer if you have the chance (be warned: not available on DVD yet).

I too would love a William Demarest museum.

Off-topic, but Mgmax, did you see Criterion is releasing three Ophuls movies in September? EARRINGS OF MADAME DE, LA RONDE, and LE PLAISIR.

Posted by lipranzer at June 21, 2008 8:05 PM

comment #15

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

No, I did not, but that's excellent news. Madame De would probably be on my top 20 list of all time, and is long overdue on DVD (I have the laserdisc, but still). The other two never hit laser, I'm pretty sure, and are overdue in any form. Le Plaisir is very good as well; La Ronde, as I recall, I found the central conceit a bit dated, but still, Schnitzler is an interesting figure for his frank treatment of sexual matters circa 1900, and all the Eyes Wide Shut admirers here will want to see an earlier treatment of the author by a director who Kubrick clearly admired a great deal-- certainly the fact that they were both obsessive camera-trackers AND Schnitzler adapters is not coincidence. If you know Ophuls, you probably know this little poem James Mason wrote during the production of either Caught or The Reckless Moment:
A shot that does not call for tracks
Is agony for poor old Max,
Who, separated from his dolly,
Is wrapped in deepest melancholy.
Once, when they took away his crane,
I thought he'd never smile again.

P.S. What happened to anklets is that they became tattoos instead.

Posted by Mgmax, le Corbeau at June 21, 2008 8:59 PM

comment #16

T. S. Idiot says ...

As others have pointed out, Fred is outstanding in those 30s and 40s comedies. True Confession and Murder, He Says are my favorites. He's also good in Pushover, a reworking of his Walter Neff.

Posted by T. S. Idiot at June 22, 2008 3:54 AM

comment #17

Rich S. says ...

And let's not forget that young Fred was the model for Captain Marvel. 30s audiences must have thought a lot of Fred for C.C. Beck to base that type of character on him. For a time, Captain Marvel was more popular than Superman.

Posted by Rich S. at June 22, 2008 5:37 AM

comment #18

vp19 says ...

Glad so many here recall Fred MacMurray's early career and his work at Paramount. He had a background in music, specifically as a saxophonist for a few notable Los Angeles dance orchestras in the early '30s, and I believe he even sang a little. (Ironically, in "Swing High, Swing Low," his character plays a trumpet, and the playing is dubbed.) His first film appearance of note came in "The Gilded Lily" with Claudette Colbert, who like Carole Lombard would become one of his regular on-screen partners.

"Hands Across The Table" is considered by many the best film Lombard ever made at Paramount ("Twentieth Century," "My Man Godfrey," "Nothing Sacred" and "To Be Or Not To Be" were all made elsewhere). It was given extra care by Ernst Lubitsch, a friend of Carole's, during his brief tenure as head of production at the studio.

When Rick Moranis was riding high with "Honey I Shrunk The Kids" and similar fare, he said he wanted to be his generation's Fred MacMurray. It's indicative of how the man is incorrectly remembered today that we know Moranis wasn't talking about being the guy who made "Hands Across The Table" or "Remember The Night." Then again, who are our equivalents of Lombard or Colbert where smart but sexy comedic actresses are concerned?

Posted by vp19 at June 22, 2008 7:00 AM

comment #19

corey3rd says ...

There needs to be a religion based on William Frawley.

Posted by corey3rd at June 22, 2008 7:40 AM

comment #20

K. Bowen says ...

I hope it contains the entire sweater collection from My Three Sons.

Posted by K. Bowen at June 22, 2008 8:51 AM

comment #21

Mgmax, le Corbeau says ...

So that'd be one sweater per season toward the end, when they'd just shoot a few shots of MacMurray in a chair saying "Well, Charlie, I'm sure the boys will work it out for themselves," and they would serve for the entire season.

Posted by Mgmax, le Corbeau at June 22, 2008 9:54 AM

comment #22