WHAT'S UP DOC?: Blu-ray re-issue (Warner Bros. 1972) Warner Archive

In the mid-1960’s, Peter Bogdanovich was a rising star of the post-studio era American cinema. A confident upstart, having begun his career as an insatiable lover of the movies, to morph from film critic to director, Bogdanovich seemingly could do no wrong, and was, for the briefest wrinkle in time, touched by an enviable inspiration to make quality pictures, usually under the most stringent conditions. Point blank: as far as the studios were concerned, Pete could do no wrong. Then came, At Long Last Love (1975). But now, I have gone ahead of myself. In the early sixties, Bogdanovich – a film programmer at MOMA, was of the perfect vintage and mindset to mingle with the resurrected reputations of his favorite directors of yore – Orson Welles, John Ford and Howard Hawks: all, still very much alive, and eager to discuss their past glories with him. Heavily influenced by Cahiers du Cinéma, Bogdanovich built his own reputation as a critic for Esquire. But in 1966, Bogdanovich decided he wanted something more than an outsider’s perspective. He wanted to make movies himself. And thus, an alliance was struck with indie picture-maker, Roger Corman – resulting in several B movies Bogdanovich directed under a pseudonym. At the age of 32, Bogdanovich made The Last Picture Show (1971), a ‘Wellesian’-styled masterpiece to earn 8 Oscar nominations and the love of then gal/pal 21-yr.-old Cybill Shepherd, for whom he divorced his long-time collaborator, Polly Platt – the mother of his 2 children.

Bogdanovich’s follow-up to the moody Last Picture Show, proved an unusual departure, and an even more unlikely smash hit: What’s Up Doc? (1972) – Bogdanovich’s stab at resurrecting the classic screwball comedy, costarring Barbra Streisand and Ryan O’Neal. With back-to-back smashes, Bogdanovich solidified his reputation in the industry as a hit maker, and one of the ‘new breed’ to include Francis Ford Coppola and William Friedkin, with whom he eventually formed The Directors Company – a short-lived, indie producer/director-based fledging, inking a lucrative deal with Paramount – then, being run by the wunderkind/maverick, Robert Evans. Essentially, the deal gave the trio carte blanche within their agreed upon budgets. Viewed today, What’s Up Doc? remains a deliciously goofy chef d’oeuvre, imbued with a light sense of the zany for which Bogdanovich had Streisand to his credit with her ‘rapid fire’ delivery of those zingers, written into the Buck Henry/David Newman/Robert Benton screenplay. Apart from its superb yen for comedy, the picture also holds the dubious distinction as the first ever to give stunt people actual credit in the titles, a valiant, and well-deserved honor indeed, as one of their own, doubling for Streisand in long shots on a bike, broke his ankle, while another, riding in the back of an open-top convertible was knocked unconscious in the scene where a car is driven off the pier.

In preparing for the role of the stuffy brainiac, Howard Bannister, Ryan O’Neal not only watched The Lady Eve (1941) at Bogdanovich’s behest, but also met with Cary Grant, on whose straitlaced professor in Bringing Up Baby (1938) the role was more directly, and rather brilliantly conceived by Bogdanovich. Alas, Grant – a sublime bon vivant whose life’s work remains ‘being’ Cary Grant, offered O’Neal just one piece of advice. “Wear silk underpants!” Instead, O’Neal chose to adlib a line, “Judy, Judy, Judy…” that Grant never actually said in any of his movies, but O’Neal so wickedly imitated as homage to Grant, the line, ever since, has oft been associated as having originated with Grant. What’s Up Doc? also poked fun at Love Story (1970) – the runaway smash hit that had made Ryan O'Neal a huge star. At the end of this movie, Streisand’s Judy Maxwell rushes Howard, declaring “Love means never having to say you’re sorry” – a total rip-off of the line uttered by a tragically ailing Ali MacGraw in Love Story, to which O’Neal rather callously – and riotously – rebukes, “That's the dumbest thing I ever heard!”

What’s Up Doc? took its potshots at Bullitt (1968) – the Steve McQueen crowd-pleaser, beginning with a fender bender Judy causes as she crosses the street to the Bristol Hotel. As Bogdanovich had no actual stunt cars to stage the wreck, he quietly instructed a crew member to rent two vehicles from the local Hertz, making sure they took out ‘collision insurance’. After the stunt was performed, the dented wrecks were taken back to the rental dealership. What’s Up Doc?’s penultimate car chase tipped the scales at a staggering $1 million, or almost ¼ of the picture’s total budget – 11 minutes of usable footage, shot over 19 days, with 32 stuntmen. Again, Bogdanovich broke a few rules to get this sequence in the can, his lack of ‘permission’ from the city of San Francisco to drive down the steps in Alta Plaza Park doing permanent damage to municipal property and thus instituting a new law on the books for all film and television productions ever since, shooting within its city limits.

By the time filming wrapped, What’s Up Doc? was a very different picture from the one originally envisioned, based more directly on Herman Raucher’s novel, A Glimpse of Tiger – and, to have starred Elliott Gould and Kim Darby under Anthony Harvey’s direction. Indeed, Gould and Darby had already begun shooting when Gould suddenly began to behave erratically before quitting after only 4 days’ work. In Bogdanovich’s hands, What’s Up Doc? proved a more faithful reworking of Howard Hawks' screwball classic, Bringing Up Baby (1938) with the gender roles reversed, and the originally conceived Gould character now, ironically, played by his ex-wife – Streisand! As shooting got underway, Bogdanovich took his last stab at John Simon – the high-profile cultural mandarin who had savaged The Last Picture Show in his review and was none too fond of la Streisand either. Kenneth Mars played his facsimile in What’s Up Doc? - obnoxious Hugh Simon, and, a deliciously despicable caricature.

Our story begins in the fictional Hotel Bristol in San Francisco where four separate parties arrive, all toting the identical plaid overnight bag. The tote belonging to the rather cryptic and aloof, Mr. Smith (Michael Murphy) contains stolen top-secret government documents he intends to expose to the world as a whistleblower. On the other side of the same equation is the as secretive, Mr. Jones (Phil Roth) a government agent, on a mission to recover these highly classified papers. Totally unrelated to these events, but sporting the same plaid bag, is stuffy musicologist, Dr. Howard Bannister, with his demonstrative fiancée, Eunice Burns (Madeline Kahn in her movie debut). His bag contains tambala rocks possessing musical properties. The pair are in San Francisco to compete for a grant offered by Frederick Larrabee (Austin Pendleton). Howard’s only real competition for the grant is the unscrupulous, Hugh Simon. Then, there is Judy Maxwell – a fly-by-the-seat-of-her pants kind of gal, whose bag contains only the absolute essentials, plus a large dictionary. Alas, Judy is a magnet for trouble, despite being well-read, having amassed a lifetime of knowledge from the various colleges and universities from which she has been expelled. Finally, we meet uber-sophisticate, Mrs. Van Hoskins (Mabel Albertson) whose bag contains a formidable assemblage of expensive jewels.

Howard, Eunice, Mrs. Van Hoskins, and Mr. Smith all check in at the same time. Judy deviously attempts to score a free meal, then lodges herself without actually paying for the privilege, pursuing Howard as camouflage, much to his amazement and Eunice’s chagrin. Noting the contents of Van Hoskin’s bag, two hotel employees, Harry (Sorrell Booke) and Fritz (Stefan Gierasch) plot to steal her jewels. Meanwhile, Mr. Jones is in hot pursuit of Smith's bag. Now, the real fun begins, as over the course of the evening, the bags repeatedly get misappropriated from room to room as all four parties try to find the actual bag that belongs to them. Howard gets Van Hoskins’, Judy - the documents, Mr. Smith - Judy's clothes, and Fritz and Harry - Howard’s rocks. Judy plies her considerable scatterbrain wit and charisma, also her academic knowledge, to secure the grant for Howard, pretending to be Eunice at the musicologist’s banquet hosted by Larrabee. Later, circuitously, Judy contributes to the zany demolition of Howard's suite after he discovers her in his tub taking a bubble bath, and Eunice unsuspectingly walks in on them.  Howard and Judy do share a romantic moment, but one Howard is marginally ashamed of and immediately denies. Now, the entourage arrives at the Larrabee's elegant soiree where an altercation involving guns, furnishings and pie throwing leaves the evening as well as the estate in ruins.

Unable to discern which of the plaid bags belongs to him, Howard and Judy make off with all four and flee the scene, along the way stealing first, a delivery bike, then a garishly adorned Volkswagen Beetle from a wedding party, all the while being chased by Fritz, Harry, Mr. Smith, Mr. Jones, Eunice, Simon, Larrabee, and a steadily growing entourage of innocent bystanders. The chase through the streets interrupts a Chinatown parade, transgresses against some newly laid wet cement, and drives through a formidable panel of glass. Eventually, the whole mess lands into San Francisco Bay. The flailing participants are drudged from the drink and dragged into court, presided over by none other than Judge Maxwell (Liam Dunn) – Judy’s dad. Dismayed, the Judge leans on his bench, which collapses under his weight. The bags are all returned to their rightful owners. Rather magnanimously, Mrs. Van Hoskins pays for the considerable damages in Howard's name with the reward money he would have otherwise received from the safe return of her jewels. Fritz and Harry flee. Mr. Jones takes possession of the classified documents. Judy exposes Simon to Larrabee as a plagiarist, thus ensuring Howard gets the grant. Having had quite enough, Eunice dumps Howard for Larrabee. Wounded by this turn of events, Howard begrudgingly boards a plane to return to Iowa alone. Ah, but look who is in the seat next to him…Judy, declaring a ‘new’ major of study - Music History, under Howard, who can no longer deny he loves her.

What’s Up Doc? had a sell-out opener at Radio City Music Hall, breaking a house record in its first 2 weeks that had stood since 1933. The movie would eventually go on to gross $66 million, obliterating its $4 million budget. Indeed, when the final tallies were in, What’s Up Doc? ranked third in the year’s most popular fare, topped only by Coppola’s The Godfather and Irwin Allen’s disaster classic, The Poseidon Adventure. Reflecting back on What’s Up Doc? in the age of home video, where everything old is ‘literally’ new again, some of its comedy plays with a faint whiff of formaldehyde for the good ole days, the flimsy homages to a Cary Grant or Carole Lombard (on which Bogdanovich saw the character, although Streisand also borrows from Jean Arthur and Irene Dunne for her inspiration), rather transparently intermingled with Bogdanovich’s rather heavy-handed attempts to best his betters – Howard Hawks, Frank Capra and The Marx Brothers. That much of the comedy still holds up under today’s scrutiny, especially as an anathema to our present-age of sorely stupid political correctness, is indeed a tribute to how well-crafted the picture is, and how good the performances throughout it actually are, capable of sustaining our attention and respect. Streisand and O’Neal are a winning combination, and, would be teamed again in 1979’s The Main Event. Artie Butler is often credited with writing ‘the score’ for What’s Up Doc? but actually, his work herein is distilled to re-orchestrations of classic stock tunes from the Warner library, plus, arranging several songs Streisand sings in the movie. Although not a musical, Streisand performs two iconic pop tunes of their generation, the immortal - ‘As Time Goes By’ and Cole Porter’s bouncy, ‘You’re the Top’ accompanied by Ryan O’Neal.

Riding the picture’s crest of success, Bogdanovich launched into Paper Moon (1973) a Depression-era comedy to costar, Ryan O'Neal and his 10-year-old daughter, Tatum O'Neal who would go on to win the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award. In hindsight, this movie would prove the final jewel in Bogdanovich’s crown. In its wake, Bogdanovich dissolved his partnership with Coppola and Friedkin over profit-sharing differences, making back-to-back flops, Daisy Miller (1974) and, the utterly charm-free, At Long Last Love (1975) both with gal/pal Cybill Shepherd – the latter, failing so spectacularly at the box office, it all but cancelled out Bogdanovich’s fame, cache, and popularity with audiences, seemingly as a one-time/now has-been Hollywood untouchable. The release of Nickelodeon (1976) did nothing to resurrect his reputation and shortly thereafter, Bogdanovich retreated into a 3-year hiatus, regrouping with the well-received, modestly budgeted, but under-performing, Saint Jack (1979), the end of the line for Bogdanovich’s romance with Shepherd. In its wake, Bogdanovich bounced back with They All Laughed (1981), starring the ill-fated, ex-model, Dorothy Stratten, with whom Bogdanovich was involved, and, shortly thereafter, was murdered by her jealous husband, Paul Snider.

After Stratten’s death, Bogdanovich wrote The Killing of the Unicorn – Dorothy Stratten 1960–1980, a rather glowing memoir, published in 1984, perhaps as a rebuttal to Teresa Carpenter’s ‘Death of a Playmate’ article in which she claimed Bogdanovich and Playboy mogul, Hugh Hefner were conspiratorial in Stratten’s downward spiral, an accusation further compounded with the debut of Bob Fosse's movie interpretation of Stratten’s final years - Star 80 (1983), in which Bogdanovich, for libel reasons, was rechristened, Aram Nicholas, and played as a foolish and guileless figure in Stratten’s life. Bogdanovich, inadvertently, would prove his own worst enemy in regards to his association with Stratten when, at age 49, he pursued, then wed Dorothy’s 20-yr.-old sister, Louise in 1988; the marriage lasting until 2001. In 1985, Bogdanovich declared bankruptcy, his $75,000 income, paling to his monthly expenses of $200,000. That same year, Bogdanovich forwent his ambitious plans to make I'll Remember April and The Lady in the Moon to instead make Mask – a sizable hit. Alas, career instability continued to dog him, and Texasville (1990) the much-anticipated sequel to The Last Picture Show, was a flop.

As a perfectionist, Bogdanovich’s clashes with studio intervention over final cut and creative control are legendary. Although both theatrical cuts of Mask and Texasville did not represent Bogdanovich’s original vision, he was allowed a reprise on home video for each; also, to tamper with his masterpiece, The Last Picture Show, which – to date – has been available, only on home video in Bogdanovich’s ‘director’s cut’, re-edited in 1999. Bouncing back from his personal demons, Bogdanovich today is much heralded as the author of several comprehensive books on Hollywood history, culled from his encyclopedic knowledge and love of the movies. In a 2012 interview for The Hollywood Reporter, Bogdanovich spoke out against the escalating violence in motion pictures, in part adding, “Today, there's a general numbing of the audience. There's too much murder and killing. You make people insensitive by showing it all the time. The body count in pictures is huge. It numbs the audience into thinking it's not so terrible. Back in the '70s, I asked Orson Welles what he thought was happening to pictures, and he said, ‘We're brutalizing the audience. We're going to end up like the Roman circus, live at the Coliseum.’ The respect for human life seems to be eroding.” Indeed.

So, we are exceedingly grateful to see pictures like What’s Up Doc? re-circulating in hi-def. If ever the world needed a good reason to laugh – it’s now!  What’s Up Doc? is yet another reissue on Blu-ray via the Warner Archive (WAC) and, true to form, the studio has put its best feet forward yet again, on another sparkling transfer to show off László Kovács’ grain-rich imagery to its very best advantage. What’s Up Doc? was already a Blu from Warner Home Video proper, and the master here is merely a regurgitation of those previous efforts. Same disc. Same extras. Colors are gorgeously real, with accurately rendered flesh tones. Exteriors are brightly lit, while interiors sport a sort of faux realism that bodes well for the zany antics performed by all. Contrast is spot on. Once again, no complaints. The 1.0 DTS mono audio is in keeping with the original theatrical release, and, within its limitations, is adequately represented. Extras include 2 commentaries – a scene specific one featuring Barbra Streisand, and a full-length feature commentary by Bogdanovich, which is the preferred and infinitely more fascinating listening experience. We also get ‘Screwball Comedies…remember them?’ – a featurette produced during the making of the movie and released a few months prior to promote its upcoming theatrical release. Finally, there is an original theatrical trailer. Bottom line: What’s Up Doc? is an escapist rom/com that effectively reworks the time-honored precepts of golden era screwball into a lather for a whole new generation. Were that At Long Last Love could have done as much for the glossy art deco musical mélange as well as keep the faith in Bogdanovich’s aspirations, his would have been a very different trajectory and career. Bottom line: WAC’s new-to-Blu of What’s Up Doc? is a winner through and through. Blind purchase for those who don’t already own the previously issued Blu. Laugh – and, sincerely remember what it was like, back in the day, to do so – unapologetically!

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

3.5

VIDEO/AUDIO

4.5

EXTRAS

2