BEACH PARTY—the one, the only (okay, not the only), the original. Primed by 1959’s sleeper Gidget, Jan & Dean’s #1 hit “Surf City”  and The Beach Boys “Surfin’ U.S.A.”, which not only reached Billboard’s #2 but hung on the charts for 78 weeks, hep-to-the-moment  William Asher directed & co-wrote (with Lou Rusoff) the first of the seven ‘official’ Beach Party inanities.  With five offshoots, the series ran thru four years of terrible jokes, rear-projected wave riding, ‘surprise’ guest stars, wild gyrations and hot bods. The Pre-Teen Who Walked Among Us sighs a silent and affectionate ‘thank you’.    “I like you. And when Eric Von Zipper likes someone, they stay liked.”

Sun-kissed Southern California coast: Newport, Laguna, Balboa and especially Malibu. When “the kids” (late teens, just nigh of college) hit the beach for making the waves and makin’ out, their mating rituals become a prime primal study zone for anthropologist professor ‘Robert Orville Sutwell’ (Bob Cummings, 53), who is in dire need of getting duh in the groove according to Marianne’ (Dorothy Malone, 39 & divine) his frank-for-frolic assistant. Specimens for research include spatting couple ‘Frankie’ (Frankie Avalon, 22) and ‘Dolores’ (Annette Funicello, 20) and their endlessly romping peers. Not high in the IQ department, the clean-cut gang has territory issues with Wild One’ish biker ‘Eric Von Zipper’ (Harvey Lembeck, 39) and his gaggle of ‘Rats’ and ‘Mice’, obedient to his finger snaps and continual reminders that they are stupid, as in “You stupid“.

Kids ate it up like Hostess Cupcakes. As Asher put it “the key to these pictures is lots of flesh but no sex. It’s all good clean fun. No hearts are broken and virginity prevails.” Today, sitting thru the whole 101 minutes is a bit of a challenge unless you can dial in the nostalgia knob; still, there are some smiles to re-find. They start with the the giddy innocence of Annette & Frankie’s opener duet of “Beach Party (Tonight)”.  Annette (childhood crush of crushes), outfitted with a hairdo that could act as a sail, does two more, Frankie one. His is “Don’t Stop Now”, a reasonably hep number, comes when heat-seeking Hungarian torpedo Eva Six shows up (“Monroe’s face, Mansfield’s body and Zsa-Zsa’s accent”) to dance with abandon and make doll-next-door Annette jealous. The group gyrations from Ms. Six and the lissome beach girls feature a lot of lower torso contortions (the camera on regional favoring) and kind of make you wish that Avalon could actually sing.

Dick Dale and the Del Tones bang out “Swingin’ and a-Surfin'”, with Dick (looking tres retro cool) blazing a few of his guitar licks while 19-year-old perpetual motion machine Candy Johnson whirls about the room at light speed: her moves during the closing credits are a wonder of science. The background score from Les Baxter throws in plenty of good drumming.

A pro at turning a line inside out, Cummings knows just how to play the silliness straight and get some actual laughs (95% of the humor is frankly pathetic), Lembeck got a new lease on life with von Zipper, while Malone, whose movie career had faded in favor of mostly TV, is regrettably wasted in a nothing part. In the second row are John Ashley, 28 (he’d later become a successful producer) and Jody McCrea (28, Joel’s son, he was the only one in the cast who could surf), both would become part of the Beach ensemble. The ‘surprise’ guest at the finish is Vincent Price.

“Frankie, that’s just it. I don’t trust myself when I’m alone with you.”

Inoffensive silliness, it transcended critics sniffs to gross $6,400,000, 44th place in ’63, a veritable bonanza next to the $350,000 cost. With Morey Amsterdam (someone, tell me why?), Andy Romano, Delores Wells, Meredith MacRae (18, brief mini-crush time thanks to TVs My Three Sons and Petticoat Junction), Valora Noland, Mike Nader, Yvette Vickers (as one of the yoga girls).

* Credited screenwriter Lou Gossoff had done duty on a host of Roger Corman epics (all hail Day The World Ended and It Conquered The World); he did not live to see the success of his beach opus, passing away during the editing. Seven months later Asher, Frankie, Annette and friends followed the incoming swells to Muscle Beach Party.