TAMMY AND THE BACHELOR: Blu-ray (Universal, 1957) Universal Home Video

When one pauses to think of all-around great entertainers, the name Debbie Reynolds ought to remain at the top of the short-list; arguably, riding shotgun next to the likes of Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney, Bing Crosby, Barbra Streisand, and, Angela Lansbury. Legends are hard to come by, despite Hollywood’s thinly veiled, and, rather desperate attempts of late to manufacture a new breed of icons from this generation’s thoroughly disposable batch. Lest we forget: true stardom cannot be taught. You either have it or not. It can be manufactured after the fact, honed, polished and refined. But the raw material must be there to be sculpted. And Reynolds, despite the unlikeliest of kick starts (she wanted to be a gym teacher and saw her tenure at MGM merely as a means to sock away enough cash to later go to school), would prove among the most resilient and enigmatic newcomers of her generation. “Why would they pay you $200 a week?” Reynolds’ father reportedly asked with great perplexation after being informed by his daughter a talent scout had commissioned a screen test, “You’re not even pretty.” With all due respect to Debbie’s dad – whom she adored – his short-sightedness herein is overwhelming. And Reynolds, a ham at heart, was also one of the most explosively gifted, ever to grace movie-land’s hallowed screens. The public adored her, and rightly so, siding with Reynolds as wife and mother after husband/singer, Eddie Fisher ran off with Debbie’s ‘best friend’, Elizabeth Taylor.

There are two Debbie Reynolds we should recall here: the first, a marvelous screen presence – at 5’2”, diminutive in stature, but plucky to a fault and with enough star-making charisma for two great ladies of the screen – and, Debbie Reynolds - survivor of several failed marriages, whose husbands depleted her bank accounts, but not her resolve to remain ‘unsinkably’ charming throughout her 84-year reign. I still have a hard time believing Reynolds is no longer among the living; her untimely death on Dec. 28, 2016, arguably brought on by sheer heartbreak over losing daughter, Carrie Fisher only the day before, still leaves a gaping hole in my heart for the superb raconteur and ole-time legend who spoke with candid nonchalance about everything and everybody in the film-making biz, though never with an unkind thought towards anyone. You cannot fake sincerity. You shouldn’t even try. And Reynolds was unlike virtually all other stars gone before her or since: genuine, gentle and truly touched by inspiration. So, to discover her warmth emanating from the cavernous Cinemascope screen in director, Joseph Pevney’s Tammy and the Bachelor (1957) is not so much a revelation, as par for the course of who Debbie Reynolds was in life – a bundle of energy with a fresh-faced frankness, easily to outshine and cut through the hypocrisy of her peers.  

I continue to have a soft spot – either in my heart or head – for Tammy and the Bachelor, my first exposure to it, a commercial-riddled, pan and scan TV broadcast hosted by Bill Kennedy at the Movies back in the late 1970’s; hardly, the most ideal venue. Even so, it held my attention. I will also acknowledge, it is not a great movie. But it has great appeal as a simple little programmer with a nonpareil performance by Reynolds. Based on Cid Ricketts Sumner’s quaint novel, Tammy and the Bachelor boasts oodles of homespun magic. Reynolds is delightful as the backwoods babe, Tambey ‘Tammy’ Tyree, positively radiant as the shimmering afterglow of a late afternoon summer sun. She breathes in, then expels an unspoiled enchantment, that reaches all the way to the back of the house. Most assuredly, it touched this little boy sitting on a green woolen carpet in his living room back in 1978. And, while Oscar Brodney’s screenplay never pushes Reynolds’ talents to their fullest potential, there is something to be said for the ‘simple little movie’ and Reynolds, giving this material her all, elevating the work to another level entirely. If only Reynolds had been supported by a male costar as vibrant, then Tammy and the Bachelor might have truly outshone the competition. Alas, no – Leslie Nielsen is a thoroughly wooden stick in the mud with zero spark to kindle a romantic fire – even an antiseptic one.

If the movie is known by today’s younger generation, it is likely for Jay Livingston and Ray Evans’ Oscar-nominated song, ‘Tammy’ – first sung, rather tepidly under the main titles by the Ames Brothers, and then, with infinitely more heart sore appeal by Reynolds, gazing longingly at the moon through an upstairs’ window of her would-be lover’s ancestral home. It is saying much of Reynolds, that even from our present jadedness, she burrows deep into our hearts with that rare and edifying lump in the throat to overthrow all the schmaltzy feminine pining embodied in such lyrics as “Does my lover feel what I feel when he comes near? My heart beats so joyfully…you'd think that he could hear. Wish I knew if he knew what I'm dreaming of…Tammy, Tammy, Tammy's in love. When the night is warm, soft and warm, I long for his charms. I'd sing like a violin, if I were in his arms.” to unaffectedly and gingerly tug at our heartstrings.

And then there is the sublime dramatic moment when Reynolds’ Tammy, already possessing a natural, unschooled affinity for the art of living, conjures to life the familial antiquity of a great house in the antebellum South, employing innate talents as a natural-born oral storyteller, utterly to captivate the screen audience attending her civil war recreation as well as the audience sitting just beyond the footlights. Despite its narration in fractured English as pure ‘performance’, we are never anything less than utterly transfixed by Tammy’s charisma. That it takes co-star, Leslie Nielsen’s Peter Brent longer than this to recognize Tammy’s unique and mesmerizing qualities remains just one of the mysteries (nee, stupidities) in Brodney’s watered-down screenplay. Another is Brent, having crash-landed his twin engine plane in the swamp near the houseboat Tammy shares with her grandpa, John Dinwitty (Walter Brennan), later suggesting as he convalesces, there is no one Tammy or Grandpa should contact – no one to miss him – when clearly Brent has an addlepated mother (Fay Wray), careworn father – Professor Brent (Sidney Blackmere) and eccentric aunt, Renie (Mildred Natwick) as his immediate family.  Given Peter’s absence of ten days doesn’t it seem more than a little odd none of the Brents are even remotely interested in sending out a search party to discover what has become of their number one son?

Notwithstanding Universal’s efforts to make a big and bloated Cinemascope spectacle of it, Tammy and the Bachelor mercifully falls into the ‘little gem’ classification of movie classics. Had it appeared in the forties instead of the fifties it might even have been relegated to B&W. The fifties are dully noted for their excess and ‘bigger is better’ philosophy – accommodated by the widescreen rage, kicked off by This is Cinerama (1952); though ‘officially’ launched barely a year and a half later with 2oth Century-Fox’s patented ‘scope’ process.  Bausch and Lomb’s anamorphic lenses presented certain drawbacks, including a slight horizontal stretching of the image, affectionately known as the Cinemascope mumps.  Arthur E. Arling’s cinematography is pretty straight forward – a lot of pretty to look at, brightly lit, and occasionally flat scenes, filling the vast expanses of the elongated frame with more bric-a-brac than action, deliberately positioning the actors as though in a carefully choreographed stage play. Even so, Tammy and the Bachelor rises above its pedestrian production values; Bill Newberry and Richard H. Riedel’s obvious sets, transparent studio-bound exteriors, and, Clifford Stine’s occasionally flubbed matte work – fooling no one.

The picture’s success (and it is successful at unabashedly taking dead aim at our heartstrings) rests squarely on Debbie Reynold’s slender shoulders. Walter Brennan, one of golden-age Hollywood’s irrefutable treasures, is utterly wasted as Grandpa. Leslie Nielsen’s approach to the blonde-haired/smooth-shaven young buck any woman would throw herself at, is about as exciting as watching lead paint cure.  But Reynolds proves the glue to hold everyone and everything together. Her jubilation and earnestness in the part is a wonder. Our story begins with an inseparable duo: Tammy and Nan’ (her goat) by a babbling brook near the Ellenbee, a shanty riverboat Tammy lives on with Grandpa. Learning of a terrific plane wreck up the river, Tammy and Grandpa row to the site, coming across the bedraggled and unconscious body of Peter Brent. Grandpa believes Pete is done for. Tammy has other ideas. Nursing Peter to health, Tammy develops a healthy infatuation Brent is neither anxious to discourage nor exactly to encourage. Now, how is that for a male tease?

Unhappily for Tammy, the day arrives when Peter is well enough to return to his own family. He does and all but forgets about Tammy – that is, until she comes up the road with Nan’ looking for what has become of him. It seems Grandpa has been indicted and sent to jail for selling corn liquor; a considerable offense in these parts. Through a mis-assumption Grandpa has died, Peter’s mother and father take Tammy into their Southern-colonial home where she proves invaluable as both a cook and housekeeper. Peter’s eccentric aunt, Renie (Mildred Natwick) finds Tammy invigorating. Mrs. Brent would prefer the girl to remain silent and preferably upstairs in a guest room. Renie unearths Tammy’s genuine love for Peter and encourages the romance, despite the discrepancy in years between them, and, Peter, already being engaged to snobbish socialite, Barbara Bissle (Mala Powers). Barbara’s desire is for Peter to abandon his dream ‘farming project’ and instead go to work for her father, Alfred (Philip Ober) in the big city. Conversely, Tammy’s love of the land is more aligned with Peter’s to restore his family home to prosperity. Even so, he still only considers her as a ‘child’ and his ward. Eventually, Peter does come to his senses about the girl from the bayou, saying farewell to Barbara, who likely plans to return to Pete’s best friend, Ernie (Craig Hill) a notorious womanizer. Pete’s revelation is perfectly timed with Grandpa’s release from jail – a happy reunion for all concerned.

As Universal had an obvious hit on their hands, the studio tried in vain to get Debbie Reynolds to partake of their plans for a sequel. Prior commitments precluded the actress’ participation. And so, everyone’s favorite Gidget, Sandra Dee assumed the mantle in two cheaply made follow-ups; neither, to recapture the lithe effervescence of this original. The real problem with both sequels is that, in addition to rewriting virtually the entire history of the first movie, they also remake Reynold’s beloved and bare-foot backwoods hillbilly into a man-crazy, soft-spoken and thoroughly naïve teenage sexpot, fickle in her pursuit of two different suitors, with no mention of whatever became of her supposedly one true love, Pete. Dee’s Tammy is a Gidget knock-off, transplanted from the beach to the bayou, then, the city, for predictably silly exploits to follow. Viewed today, Dee – although briefly entering the annals of film-lore as everyone’s favorite fifties teenager in love – outstays her welcome in the Tammy franchise, almost from the moment she first appears on the screen; leaving us with even more longing to remember Debbie’s sublime turn as the delightfully unspoiled, but mindful and God-fearing girl from the sticks. Tammy and the Bachelor may not win any awards. Outside of Reynolds, the rest of the cast is a Hollywood waxwork, barely given any chance to shine. So, the picture remains a tour de force for Debbie Reynolds who meekly, though rather calculatingly, worms her way into our hearts. We love Reynolds, precisely for this quality. Too few stars of Reynolds’ generation possessed such a natural affinity to be instantly loved. Virtually none aspiring today can hold a candle to her clever art.

Tammy and the Bachelor arrives as another bare-bones Blu-ray release via Universal Home Video. It’s rather disheartening, the willy-nilly way Universal has mismanaged its back catalog in hi-def. We are, as example, still waiting for the studio to get off its lump and offer us remastered editions of Fried Green Tomatoes and Field of Dreams (two of their biggest hits from the 1990’s, each looking utterly atrocious on Blu-ray currently) to say nothing about the scores of movies in Uni’s deep catalog of home-grown classics, and those acquired from Paramount’s pre-fifties catalog, still MIA anywhere except on DVD! That Tammy and the Bachelor should have tumbled out from the archives is therefore part ‘happy accident’ and part mystery (the picture is celebrating no anniversary). The results, predictably, remain par for the course of Universal’s commitment to the classics, and, substandard to current quality control efforts being exuded elsewhere in 1080p. Tammy and the Bachelor was photographed in Technicolor and mercifully, for most of its run time, its dye transfer sustains Technicolor’s superior and resilient palette. Flesh tones are waaaay too pink and there is intermittent color fading on full display. The stock footage and matte process shots look awful, with a lot of edge enhancement, composite grit and dirt, and amplified grain. Otherwise, contrast here is pretty solid. The image is brightly lit and yields to a considerable amount of fine detail, particularly in close-ups. Age-related damage is most obvious during screen dissolves and fades, and minor gate weave also exists. The audio is 2.0 mono DTS, but very thin – especially Reynolds’ rendition of ‘Tammy’ – the orchestral accompaniment fading in and out. As with Uni’s current home video policy, we get NO extras – a genuine pity. Hollywood’s heritage deserves better. Debbie Reynolds too. Bottom line: Tammy and the Bachelor’s presentation is passable, but hardly extraordinary. Those merely interested in adding another deep catalog classic to their libraries will be satisfied with what is here. Those hoping for a pristine transfer befitting a little charmer like this should be prepared for a minor letdown. Regrets.

FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)

4

VIDEO/AUDIO

3

EXTRAS

0