jacobs-greenwood Directed by Don Weis, this Max Shulman screenplay and story was made into a cute, light early 1950's Musical comedy by pairing Debbie Reynolds with Bobby Van, and Barbara Ruick with Bob Fosse, as college kids on the campus of Grainbelt University (obviously a Midwestern locale).The most memorable musical number is the oft-repeated "All I Do Is Dream of You" (the whole day through), which Reynolds had just performed, jumping out of a cake for Gene Kelly, the previous year in Singin' in the Rain (1952). Reynolds's character alternately appears to pronounce Gillis's name as either Dobie or Dopey, which seems more appropriate. Followed by a TV series with Dwayne Hickman and Bob Denver before he became TV's Gilligan.Pansy Hammer (Reynolds) enters college with the university's motto "work, work, work, learn, learn, learn" drummed into her head by her protective father (Hanley Stafford). That is until she meets Dobie Gillis (Van), who's come to college to have fun. Not so slowly as surely, he convinces her to adopt his carefree way.Ruick plays another girl, instantly stuck on Dobie, who's pursued and eventually learns to love Gillis's roommate Charlie Trask (Fosse). Hans Conried plays an amusingly arrogant English professor; Charles Lane plays a chemistry teacher. The young couple gets in real trouble after they start skipping classes to be together and Pansy, for the umpteenth time, blows up the chemistry lab when they're trying to makeup their work.After this last incident, against the protests of his wife (Lurene Tuttle, actress Ruick's real mother) and daughter, Pansy's father decides to separate the two lovebirds by sending his daughter to a college in New York, where she'll live with her Aunt (Almira Sessions). Charles Halton appears, uncredited, as the Dean of Grainbelt University. So, Dobie and his two friends try to figure out a way for him to make a trip to see Pansy in New York.After a failed book buying scheme (Percy Helton appears, uncredited, in the campus bookstore), brought about by Gillis's own plagiarism, Dobie finally ends up convincing the near defunct campus magazine manager (Archer MacDonald) out of $1,000 so that he can go to New York to hire a big-named band for a dance to save it. Since he spends almost half the money wining and dining Pansy in the Big Apple, he can only afford to hire "Happy Stella" Kowalski (Kathleen Freeman) and her German quintet.But this is a musical comedy, with some dancing by Van et al, so naturally everything will work out in the end ... after all, human nature means everyone rushes to see a train wreck (and will pay for the privilege), right?

classicsoncall As much as I wanted to capture the nostalgic feel of "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis" TV show, it was just not to be while watching this earlier preview featuring Bobby Van and Debbie Reynolds. The thought that came to mind was a beach picture without the beach or the one piece bathing suits on the picture's females. The film wore out it's welcome about the tenth time I heard 'Learn, learn learn, Work, work work', and that was just in the first half hour. By his own indisputable admission, Dobie (Van) is a fun seeker, who's prime directive employs the ideal 'Workers ought to work, and enjoyers ought to enjoy'. There's never any doubt in which category Master Gillis belongs.Before she joined the slackers club, Debbie Reynolds looked like she might have been the proverbial too good to be true catch for Dobie, but their romance is cinched almost from the get go. On the other hand, Lorna Ellingboe (Barbara Ruick) is more than hormonally challenged by the sight of Dobie on campus. How all these lovebirds reconcile their feelings for each other is part of the meandering script, with caper after caper usually ending in disaster.The one surprise I wasn't expecting here was the presence of legendary dance choreographer and director Bob Fosse. For most of the picture, he was Lorna's noble meatball, but when he breaks into a solo dance number, he's simply amazing. Later he tries not to show up buddy Dobie in a choreographed number that also includes the girls. Those two spots would have been the highlight of the film for me.If you tune in expecting to see characters from the TV show, be warned. There's no Maynard G. Krebs or Zelda Gilroy, no Chatsworth T. Osborne Jr. or Frank Faylen knock off portraying Dobie's grocer dad. Depending on your mood, this one could be mildly entertaining or just a complete bore. Unfortunately, it looks like I caught it on a bad day.

moonspinner55 College freshman Dobie Gillis (Bobby Van, exercising more befuddled expressions and quirky dance movements than even Ray Bolger) falls for a perky, studious innocent (Debbie Reynolds) on his first day of enrollment; he also makes a buddy in Bob Fosse, who apparently trolls for curvier dames. MGM musical with the usual stuffed-shirt parents and teachers who never have any fun (as if they'd outgrown it completely). The kids are crazy-cool, treating life with abandon and dancing jitterbug-style in coffeehouses which probably looked very flashy in 1953. They are required to do some classwork, but this college campus is the fictional type wherein something is always comically exploding in the chemistry lab. If the leads weren't so talented this might make your teeth ache, but--for the first two-thirds of an hour--it isn't bad and the infrequent songs are quite good. Fosse, who seems stuck in an ugly white pullover with a stripe around the waist, talks amusingly (and probably unintentionally) like one of the Bowery Boys, yet his small muscular frame and early-receding hairline are boyishly charming; Reynolds can't get a proper grip on her character due to the writing, but she's a very good sport. ** from ****

Phil Reeder After I warmed up to the taller, goofier-looking Bobby Van (compared to Dwayne Hickman), this movie really took off for me. Like many others, I didn't know there was a movie six years before the TV series debuted. I'm only a casual fan of DG (it doesn't get shown enough these days) but still wanted to see how this early version compared to the show. I wasn't disappointed. I noticed a similarity between this picture and Disney's Merlin Jones movies. But whereas Merlin was this semi-genius, Dobie is an underachiever out for fun and females.Die-hard fans of Zelda will be crestfallen to learn that she is mercifully absent here. She is replaced by the much more feminine Debbie Reynolds, who ferments a good screen chemistry with Van; that's appropriate, as their most harrowing adventures take place in the chemistry lab (Pansy is fond of mixing assorted substances until they explode).But where is Herbert T. Gillis, Dobie's workaholic grocer old man seen in the series? He was my favorite character, mainly because of Frank Faylen's inimitable characterization (he was also hilarious as Dearborne in Disney's THE MONKEY'S UNCLE). Instead of Dobie's family we get Pansy's blustery workaholic father, who wants to separate the lovebirds forever. Has anyone else noticed, by the way, how fathers are perpetually portrayed as silly windbags, while the boring cipher wife/mother is forever made out to be the "wise" one? Even in the 50's.Strangely, it seems as though Dobie and Pansy only took two courses - English and Chemistry. And what about that chemistry prof, who boasts that his class is the hardest they'll ever encounter? Guess he never heard of Cartography at Radford U. After playing hooky (except when it rained) for several months, they return to class to find an essay due in English and a project due in Chemistry. I won't give away how they solve this crisis. But then the sky falls on our amorous pair. Deeming Dobie the worst possible influence, Mr. Hammer sends Pansy to NYC (blah - like that's the greatest place on earth to be sent) to live with her horrid maiden aunt. You really feel depressed for Dobie, now wandering aimlessly around campus. After all the scrapes they'd been through together - the chemistry lab explosions; the capsized canoe; and the most hysterical of all - Pansy's blouse getting caught in the car engine, then her trying to sneak past Ma and Pa and a couple of neighbors watching TV (yes, they had TV in 1953). Then when a gun goes off on TV, the startled viewers suddenly become aware of Pansy in her undergarments. That scene ended perfectly.All this brings us to some intriguing questions about college life in the 50's. Was it common for professors to write their own textbooks? We have the deliciously snobbish, condescending Hans Conried (Prof. Pomfritt) announcing that he is rewriting his "English Usage For College Freshmen", suddenly accepting Dobie's belief that the rules should be according to the way people really talk. C'mon, a single professor rewriting the rules of grammar? And did academic buildings really have bells to dismiss the students? Sounds like high school all over again. All classes beginning and ending at the same time. Well, I know one thing in the movie that's definitely based in reality: the way school bookstores buy back used books for pennies on the dollar, then resell them at a 90% markup. This textbook racket is still flourishing!Absent from AODG is Dobie's endless philosophizing in front of a marble statue. But I don't expect you'll really miss that.All in all, I recommend THE AFFAIRS OF DOBIE GILLIS to even the most casual fan of the TV series, and to anyone who likes college slapstick/romance from the 50's. I only wish this movie had been long enough to include more professors played by character actors on the caliber of Hans Conried. Or a series of 75-minute films, where Dobie and Pansy take Psychology, physics, French...imagine the constant jams they'd've been in and out of. I know Debbie Reynolds went on to bigger things, like voicing Charlotte in CHARLOTTE'S WEB and giving birth to Princess Leia, but she could've been replaced by some other bodacious 50's babe. And no, I don't mean Zelda.