Murder by Death: JUST BECAUSE!

This is written by Neil Simon NOT Truman Capote, but I love it and I’m writing about it because it’s my blog. Also, understand this is no where near as fantastic as Clue, but still fun.

Murder by Death is a parody of the popular detective genre of the 1920s. Six sleuths who each make-fun of a popular character are invited to a dinner and death at the house of Lionel Twain (played by Truman Capote). The cast is huge and the jokes are silly. Peter Sellers plays Sidney Wang, a version of Charlie Chan. Peter Falk practices his later Columbo character as Sam Diamond, not Spade. Nick and Nora Charles become Dick and Dora Charleston played by David Niven and Maggie Smith respectively. Milo Perrier takes Hercule Poirot’s place and portrayed by James Coco. Lastly, Ms. Marple . . . I mean, Jessica Marbles is acted out by one of my favorites, Elsa Lanchester. Eileen Brennan, Estelle Winwood, James Cromwell, and Richard Narita play the detectives’ various companions. The cast is rounded out by Alec Guinness and Nancy Walker as Twain’s unusual servants.

Twain promises a substantial sum to the detective who solves the evening’s murder first. I don’t want to give away the mystery or many of the jokes. Here are a few specifics I want to gush about.

1. Diamond’s “doll” creates a dossier on Twain before they arrive. He asks her where she got the information and she said, “I called him up and asked him.”

2. Wang (who is played by a white guy which I think was meant to be a joke at all the white guys who played Charlie Chan . . . But I really wish there had been more jokes about him not actually being Chinese) has an adopted son who he makes do everything including standing in the way of danger.

3. The Charlestons have a dog named Myron and Dora is always carrying a martini glass, even when she’s in a car.

4. Perrier has a chauffeur that appears to be his boyfriend, but he treats him terribly. Every time something happens to the chauffeur, Perrier says to ignore him. “He just wants attention.” There is also a running gag about Perrier’s relationship to food. For example, he spits out wine and the others think it was poisoned. “Bad year,” he explains.

5. Mrs. Marbles pushes around her nurse in a wheelchair and has a long standing friendship with Diamond. It’s funny to think of a world where the very English small town Miss Marple hung out with the quick tempered, fowl mouth Spade.

6. All of the detectives try to out-detect each other.

7. The screaming doorbell was a soundbite of Fay Wray.

8. Twain’s insistence that Wang use proper articles and pronouns. “It. IT is confusing!”

9. Twain’s monologue about mystery books: “You've tricked and fooled your readers for years. You've tortured us all with surprise endings that made no sense. You've introduced characters in the last five pages that were never in the book before. You've withheld clues and information that made it impossible for us to guess who did it. But now, the tables are turned. Millions of angry mystery readers are now getting their revenge. When the world learns I've outsmarted you, they'll be selling your $1.95 books for twelve cents.You've tricked and fooled your readers for years. You've tortured us all with surprise endings that made no sense. You've introduced characters in the last five pages that were never in the book before. You've withheld clues and information that made it impossible for us to guess who did it. But now, the tables are turned. Millions of angry mystery readers are now getting their revenge. When the world learns I've outsmarted you, they'll be selling your $1.95 books for twelve cents.”

Young Cassidy: Movies about Writing

I’ve been meaning to watch this film for years. TCM plays each St. Patrick’s Day so let’s do this.

Young Cassidy is a fictionalized account of Irish playwright Sean O’Casey’s autobiography. Johnny Cassidy (Rod Taylor) lives in a rundown house full of books with his mother and siblings who are all desperate for work in English controlled Dublin. Cassidy’s writing begins with protest pamphlets about Irish nationalism. The anonymous pamphlets end up inciting riots where many people are injured and killed. Cassidy decides that stirring up violence isn’t helping and decides to write newspaper articles and dramas about the plight of the Irish instead.

When Johnny publishes his first article and is paid for it, he celebrates by buying six copies of the paper and a book on drilling. He and other men around town form a militia, however, when the men start to think illogically, Cassidy leaves. After a battle (a weird battle that has an Irish stereotype where a man’s whiskey is destroyed and while he moans about it is shot), he writes a book about his fallen friends and is paid 15 pounds by an English publisher in Dublin. Hover, they pay him a check when he has no bank account so he can’t cash the damn thing.

The first play Johnny sends in is sent back the comment “a bit long on character and a bit short on plot”. He edits it, sends it again this time famous playwright, poet, and folklorist W.B. Yeats sends it back, saying, “a bit long on plot and a bit short on character.” The third time he sends the play, it’s lost. This is a legit scenario here. Eventually, one of his plays is produced and he explains to his girlfriend that “writing is love” to him and she takes it personally. Still, she’s supportive when his first play is a flop. Despite the lack of commercial success, the founders of the theatre Yeats and Lady Gregory encourage him to write more.

I’ve never read anything by Sean O’Casey, but plenty by Yeats and other Irish writers of the time who tried to use Irish culture as a way subtly fight back against the oppression of the English. I know enough about the different reasoning for Irish protest to call it oppression. I though his sister’s story was the saddest. Ella married the first man she could to escape Dublin, but he abandoned her with five children. Their mother speaks of Ella’s depression and current personality, according to Cassidy, “as if she had died”. Spoiler alert - Ella does die. But it adds to Cassidy’s fight and trying to fight using as he says it, “Beauty”. “[Ella] used to say that beauty was more important than bread. How do I explain that to her children?”

This film was always advertised to be about young exploits and Irish shenanigans than writing. Among his political struggles are the tales of his love affairs. His first notable relationship is with scandalous actress and kept woman Daisy (Julie Christie). His second is with bookshop worker Nora (Maggie Smith) who is impressed with his love of reading and sends him books he tried to steal. Why is there no public library in Dublin at this time? It’s supposed by like 1910 or 1911. Most major cities in America had libraries? What the heck.

But the movie is more about his love of country and how he could use writing to rebel. Nora makes a classist comment about needing a “high education” to be a writer.