My Favorite Spy (1951 film)

Not to be confused with My Favorite Spy (1942 film).

My Favorite Spy
1951 US Theatrical Poster
Directed byNorman Z. McLeod
Written byEdmund L. Hartmann
Jack Sher
Hal Kanter
Lou Breslow
Edmund Beloin
Produced byPaul Jones
StarringBob Hope
Hedy Lamarr
Francis L. Sullivan
CinematographyVictor Milner
Edited byFrank Bracht
Music byVictor Young
Production
company
Distributed byParamount Pictures
Release date
  • December 25, 1951 (1951-12-25) (New York)[1]
Running time
93 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Box office$2.6 million (U.S. rentals)[2]

My Favorite Spy is a 1951 American comedy spy film directed by Norman Z. McLeod and starring Bob Hope, Hedy Lamarr and Francis L. Sullivan. It was produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures and forms the third of a loose trilogy featuring Hope that includes My Favorite Blonde and My Favorite Brunette.

Plot

American intelligence agents recruit burlesque comic Peanuts White to pose as international spy Eric Augustine, whom he resembles, to acquire a million-dollar microfilm in Tangier, Morocco. While there, he encounters Lily Dalbray, a woman whom he had once known and who is now in league with his arch enemy Brubaker.

Wearing an uncomfortable money belt containing one million dollars in payoff money, Peanuts is assigned a right-hand man named Tasso. There are repeated attempts on his life, and on one occasion, he and Tasso must dodge assassins inside a two-man camel costume.

The real Eric Augustine escapes from the hospital and arrives in Tangier. He finds Lily and beats her before being killed by Brubaker's men. However, Lily thinks that it was Peanuts who had hit her and is enraged. Peanuts confesses to the deception in order to calm her.

Peanuts and Lily are captured by Brubaker and taken to his villa. Peanuts is injected with truth serum, which causes him to recite some of his old burlesque routines. After Lily switches loyalties, she and Peanuts escape after setting fire to Brubaker's mansion. They run to the nearest firehouse and don fireman uniforms, but the fire alarm returns them right back to Brubaker's house. They escape in a hijacked fire engine with Peanuts dangling precariously from the highest point of a hook-and-ladder rig.

Brubaker makes such a public spectacle of himself during the chase that he is recognized and arrested, the microfilm safely in the right hands.

Cast

Production

The film was produced from late January to early April 1951 under the working title Passage to Cairo.

Hope's character was first conceived as a schoolteacher who, while impersonating a recently deceased gangster, is sent to Cairo to obtain information. The character was later converted into the Peanuts White vaudeville comedian.

Release

The world premiere of the film took place in Bellaire, Ohio in the living room of Anne Kuchinka, a housewife who had won a letter-writing contest sponsored by Hope's radio show, selected from among 250,000 entrants. Many of the townspeople of Bellaire also wrote Hope to lobby on Kuchinka's behalf. A parade was held and Hope hosted a show for the town featuring guests Rhonda Fleming, Gloria Grahame, Marilyn Maxwell, Jan Sterling and Jerry Colonna, with music by Les Brown and his band. Hope conducted his regular radio show live from the town's high-school auditorium.[3]

Reception

In a contemporary review for The New York Times, critic A. H. Weiler wrote: "'My Favorite Spy' is difficult to believe but because of its harried hero's breezy delivery it does generate a generous portion of laughs."[1]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b Weiler, A. H. (December 26, 1951). "The Screen in Review: Six Newcomers on Holiday Fare". The New York Times. p. 19.
  2. ^ "Top Grossers of 1952". Variety. 189 (5): 61. January 7, 1953.
  3. ^ "Bob Hope Returning To Ohio for Premiere". The Marion Star. Marion, Ohio. November 22, 1951. p. 9B.
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