User Reviews

Frequently one has to wonder about how certain careers would have panned out but for luck or re-direction. Fidel Castro has (for better or worse) written his name in history books as the Dictator of Cuba since 1959, and yet he seriously was scouted as a baseball prospect for the United States once (he just missed out on it). Sir Edward Marshall-Hall, the preeminent defense counsel/barrister of most of the leading criminal cases in early 20th Century Britain seriously considered a career as a jeweler (he was an expert in jewelry). Before becoming an Indian fighter, war hero, politician, and (briefly) President of the United States, William Henry Harrison got a degree as a medical doctor (the only President to do that by the way). Closer to home, song writer and sometime composer Johnny Mercer had a successful career for awhile as a singer, and performers Lionel Barrymore and Stan Laurel were both briefly directors (Barrymore even directed Laurel and Oliver Hardy in THE ROGUE SONG).

Stan's turn as a director was within a year at the Roach Studios (in 1925 - 26). His solo work, even when first rate (DR. PYCKLE and MR. PRYDE) just did not generate audience enthusiasm. Hal Roach wanted to have a star like his previous one Harold Lloyd. Since Lloyd was now on his own, Roach tried to pick someone from his regulars. The choice should have been either Stan (if some sort of push could have been given his solo work) or Charlie Chase (certainly deserving of his own stardom - but never quite getting the recognition in his lifetime from the public). Instead Roach tried an approach called "the Hal Roach Comedy All-Stars" which certainly produced many fine comedies, but was meant to give each of the regulars a chance to show what he or she could do on screen. In the long run it did not solve anything regarding finding a new star.

Stan decided to see if his forte could be directing, and he is good at it. WISE GUYS PREFER BRUNETTES (a dig in it's title at Anita Loos' current best selling novella GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDS) is well directed, and even has a good lead in Jimmy Finlayson. Finn is the Dean of Pinkham University (like the Dover Boys in the Warner's Cartoon, the colleges' initials are "P" "U"). He is trying to restore (with the blessing of the College President, Burr McIntosh) the dignity of the University. But the females on campus are more interested in fun and clothes, congregating to the boutique in town that is owned by fellow student Helene Chadwick. Finlayson follows a pack of the girls to the boutique, and hears them making fun of him and his stuffy opinions. He confronts Chadwick and expels her from the college and orders her to close down her store in 24 hours.

Chadwick's boyfriend is Ted Healy (his name here is "Napoleon Fizz") who is a perennial student and working on a fountain of youth formula. He has just achieved it, and he and Chadwick decide to test it on Finlayson in an attempt to ruin him with McIntosh and the Board of Trustees. Finlayson does get the formula into his system, and becomes Mr. Joe College of 1926, pursuing Chadwick first in a swimming pool, and later (that night) to her rooms in her dorm. This is what Chadwick and her fellow female students want, as they plan to frame Finlayson with a photo of him supposedly making out with the hated matron of the dorm (Charlotte Mineux). The "matron" for the photo is Healy dressed in drag. But while the photo is being set up, the matron returns, and then McIntosh and his Board of Trustees shows up, leading to a series of weird confusions at the end.

It is a very funny short, not a classic perhaps but worth watching. I have never been a fan of Ted Healy, although in his day he was exceptionally popular. Best recalled for creating the Three Stooges (and then discovering they had no use for him to make film history), Healy was basically a burlesque and knock-about comic who occasionally is funny. His ending was tragic - he died officially of alcohol related nephritis, but in reality was beaten to death in a bar fight - but despite his sad end one cannot look at his various movie roles without thinking he was trying too hard to be funny and wasn't succeeding too often. The very fact that Moe, Larry, Curley, and Shemp did get as much mileage without Ted around proves his very lack of effective staying power in comedy.

Yet here his knock about is used twice, and most effectively, with Finlayson. First when he tries to force Finn to take his fountain of youth formula and then when he and Finn (both disguised as the matron) have a wrestling match in front of the women in the dorm and McIntosh and his Board of Trustees. Yes, in this film Healy's knockabout actually is funny.