FANCY PANTS—most of the generations that aged along with Bob Hope and Lucille Ball them are gone, and the current demographic dominators confuse them with 19th-century Presidents.  For us who grew disaffected with Bob and Lucy them as they got old (how dare they) and phoned it in, this flick is a nice goose to recall how good they were in their prime. The popular 1950 comedy has a goodly number of laughable scenes (in an old-fashioned way) as it does a rework of Ruggles Of Red Gap to suit Hope’s persona as hapless goof, and Ball’s as brassy wisegirl.

He plays an out-of-work actor, pretending to be an English butler, hired to carry on the deceit for his employers (cue daughter Lucy) when Teddy Roosevelt comes to their western cowtown for a speech. Silly is, silly does, but generally amusing, apart from some period Native American stereotyping that no longer sits well.

Directed at a 92-minute clip by veteran George Marshall , it made $7,400,000, #19 for the year, and co-stars Bruce Cabot, Lea Penman and Eric Blore. Robert O’Brien and Edmund L. Hartman are credited with the script, but seven other pairs of hands chipped in, too.  If not as good as Bob’s The Paleface, it still rates some applause. Second team up with Ball, after Sorrowful Jones, followed a decade later by The Facts Of Life and Critics Choice.  I Love Lucy began the year following this release.