My impression is that the original play of HAVING WONDERFUL TIME was something along the lines of Woody Allen's RADIO DAYS. Assuming that it had been funny, nearly all the humor left with the ethnicity and what was left is quite a disappointment, maybe the least movie that Ginger Rogers made between, oh, 1933 and 1949, which must cover around 50 films.
When I first saw it I wondered what had happened with the obvious dialogue looping. Fairbanks reports that he and Rogers had been called back to the studio to re-dub their lines, dropping their respective Brooklyn and Bronx accents. Thus the New York setting also is largely removed from the finished product (Jack Carson, Lucille Ball and Eve Arden retain New York accents that do not strike my ear as particularly accurate. One guesses that Fairbanks and Rogers had been more successful).
I'm not sure if the characters were originally so unpleasant on the stage. Rogers' 'Teddy' was awfully touchy and even snooty, and Fairbanks was downright cruel to that poor little blonde who asked him for a dance. Surely there was some attention paid to the supporting characters on Broadway that was cut out of the film, which runs only 71 minutes as it stands, leaving its proceedings quite threadbare. It seems that Teddy is interested in educating herself (Schopenhauer's Essays and some relatively formal grammar when she speaks) but all that really comes across is that the girl has a chip on her shoulder. You could say pretty much the same for Fairbanks, and no one else gets any serious screen time with which to develop their characters.
On the plus side, Rogers and Fairbanks do have good screen chemistry, and Ginger manages to make a backgammon game the funniest thing in the movie. Fans of Red Skelton will appreciate his first film appearance; alas, I'm not really one of them. And Big Bear Lake serves as a nice substitute for the Catskills, but other than that there isn't very much. I fear I may be a bit generous in giving it a 6/10.
When I first saw it I wondered what had happened with the obvious dialogue looping. Fairbanks reports that he and Rogers had been called back to the studio to re-dub their lines, dropping their respective Brooklyn and Bronx accents. Thus the New York setting also is largely removed from the finished product (Jack Carson, Lucille Ball and Eve Arden retain New York accents that do not strike my ear as particularly accurate. One guesses that Fairbanks and Rogers had been more successful).
I'm not sure if the characters were originally so unpleasant on the stage. Rogers' 'Teddy' was awfully touchy and even snooty, and Fairbanks was downright cruel to that poor little blonde who asked him for a dance. Surely there was some attention paid to the supporting characters on Broadway that was cut out of the film, which runs only 71 minutes as it stands, leaving its proceedings quite threadbare. It seems that Teddy is interested in educating herself (Schopenhauer's Essays and some relatively formal grammar when she speaks) but all that really comes across is that the girl has a chip on her shoulder. You could say pretty much the same for Fairbanks, and no one else gets any serious screen time with which to develop their characters.
On the plus side, Rogers and Fairbanks do have good screen chemistry, and Ginger manages to make a backgammon game the funniest thing in the movie. Fans of Red Skelton will appreciate his first film appearance; alas, I'm not really one of them. And Big Bear Lake serves as a nice substitute for the Catskills, but other than that there isn't very much. I fear I may be a bit generous in giving it a 6/10.