Please Don't Eat the Daisies | |
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![]() Theatrical poster | |
Directed by | Charles Walters |
Screenplay by | Isobel Lennart |
Based on | Please Don't Eat the Daisies 1957 book by Jean Kerr |
Produced by | Joe Pasternak |
Starring | Doris Day David Niven Janis Paige Richard Haydn Spring Byington |
Cinematography | Robert J. Bronner |
Edited by | John McSweeney Jr. |
Music by | David Rose |
Production company | Euterpe Inc. |
Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
Release date |
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Running time | 112 min |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $1,775,000 [2] |
Box office | $7,050,000 [2] |
Please Don't Eat the Daisies is a 1960 Metrocolor comedy film in CinemaScope starring Doris Day and David Niven, [3] made by Euterpe Inc., and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The movie was directed by Charles Walters and produced by Joe Pasternak, with Martin Melcher (Day's husband) as associate producer. [3]
The screenplay was written by Isobel Lennart and was partly inspired by the 1957 book of the same name, a collection of humorous essays, by Jean Kerr. [4] [5]
The film also features Janis Paige, Spring Byington, Richard Haydn, Patsy Kelly, and Jack Weston. Spring Byington [3] made her final film appearance in this film, but appeared in TV shows later.
A television series starring Patricia Crowley and Mark Miller premiered five years later and ran for 58 episodes.
Professor Lawrence "Larry" Mackay and his wife Kate are struggling with four young sons in a tiny two-bedroom apartment in New York City. Months before, they had announced their intention to move to a house in the country, but have not been able to find one. Meanwhile, their lease has expired and the landlord has rented out their apartment to someone who insists they vacate in three weeks. They decide to again look for a house in the country, but the only thing they can afford is a run-down mansion complete with secret panels and trap doors, 70 miles away by train in fictional Hooton. They have no choice but to move in and start fixing it up.
Before the moving chaos, Larry has left his professorship at the university to become a drama critic for a major New York newspaper. His first assignment is to review the new show produced by his best friend, Alfred North. The show is awful, and Larry's review is especially hard on the show's star, Deborah Vaughn, who gets her revenge by hiring a press photographer to capture her slapping Larry's face at Sardi's. This publicity stunt, along with Larry's published response, makes Larry the toast of the town. Kate and Larry are suddenly invited to society parties and hobnobbing with the rich and famous, which begins to go to Larry's head. With the hammering and builders at home, Larry decides to stay in a hotel in the city for a week, leaving Kate to organize the new house.
Back home, Kate tries her best to manage the four children and fit into their new community. When asked by the local dramatic society to find them an original play for their next production, Kate turns to Alfred. Alfred, seeing a chance for a bit of revenge of his own, gives them a terrible play written by a young Lawrence Mackay — with an altered title and fictitious playwright listed on the cover. Alfred then secretly invites all of the major New York critics to review the play. Larry finds out and has a huge fight with Kate, blaming her for his professional embarrassment. He refuses to allow the show to go on. Kate insists it is too late for the Hooton Holler Players to get another show ready, so Larry reluctantly allows them to proceed, publishing his own review of the show before opening night.
Not to be left out, Deborah Vaughn decides to strike up a close, personal friendship with Larry, flattering him seductively. Kate's mother Suzie Robinson urges her to get Larry back before it is too late. Kate and Larry make up and return to their country home in time for one of the boys to drop a water bomb on them from an upstairs window.
MGM acquired rights to the book for $75,000. Kerr stipulated that they had to fictionalize everything to avoid additional publicity for her family. [7]
According to MGM records the film earned $5,150,000 in the US and Canada and $1.9 million elsewhere, resulting in a profit of $1,842,000. [2]
Bosley Crowther of The New York Times found the characters "over-eager, over-witty and overwrought—and also undernourished with the substance of good solid farce." [8] Variety declared, "Yarn launches with a couple of belly laughs, and this high degree of merriment is sustained more or less through its entire 111-minutes' running time, long for a comedy but so well turned out here that it's seldom in need of shearing." [9] Philip K. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times wrote that "any resemblance between Lawrence Mackay and any drama critic I ever heard of is purely coincidental. What resemblance remains between the essays and the movie I can't say—except that the movie certainly isn't very funny." [10] Harrison's Reports declared, "Although the humor is more of the hearty chuckle than belly laugh variety, there is enough of it to give a merry effect which is delicately balanced against the seriousness of the problems of a professor turned drama critic." [11] John McCarten of The New Yorker wrote, "One and all try hard to amuse, but the screenplay defies them." [12]
"Please Don't Eat the Daisies" is played in the background of the beginning of the Liam Kyle Sullivan internet music videos "Shoes" and "Text Message Break-up".
Doris Day was an American actress and singer. She began her career as a big band singer in 1939, achieving commercial success in 1945 with two No. 1 recordings, "Sentimental Journey" and "My Dreams Are Getting Better All the Time" with Les Brown and His Band of Renown. She left Brown to embark on a solo career and recorded more than 650 songs from 1947 to 1967.
Madge Blake was an American character actress best remembered for her role as Larry Mondello's mother, Margaret Mondello, on the CBS/ABC sitcom Leave It to Beaver, as Flora MacMichael on the ABC/CBS sitcom The Real McCoys, and as Aunt Harriet Cooper in 96 episodes of ABC's Batman. Gene Kelly had a special affection for her and included her in each of his films following her role in An American in Paris.
Jean Kerr was an American author and playwright born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, who authored the 1957 bestseller Please Don't Eat the Daisies and the plays King of Hearts in 1954 and Mary, Mary in 1961.
Eye of the Devil, also known by its working title 13 or Thirteen, is a 1966 British mystery horror film directed by J. Lee Thompson and starring Deborah Kerr, David Niven, Donald Pleasence and Sharon Tate. Adapted from the 1964 novel Day of the Arrow by Philip Loraine, the movie is set in rural France. It was shot at the Château de Hautefort and in England. The film's plot concerns a family inheritance of an estate shrouded by a mysterious and highly ritualistic veil of secrets, and the investigation that follows in trying to uncover the meaning of these ominous peculiarities.
Jack Weston was an American actor. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in 1976 and a Tony Award in 1981.
Spring Dell Byington was an American actress. Her career included a seven-year run on radio and television as the star of December Bride. She was a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract player who appeared in films from the 1930s to the 1960s. Byington received a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Penelope Sycamore in You Can't Take It with You (1938).
John Elmer Carson, known as Jack Carson, was a Canadian-born American film actor. Carson often played the role of comedic friend in films of the 1940s and 1950s, including The Strawberry Blonde (1941) with James Cagney and Arsenic and Old Lace (1944) with Cary Grant. He appeared in such dramas as Mildred Pierce (1945), A Star is Born (1954), and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958). He worked for RKO and MGM, but most of his notable work was for Warner Bros.
Please Don't Eat the Daisies is a best-selling collection of humorous essays by American humorist and playwright Jean Kerr about suburban living and raising four boys. The essays do not have a plot or through-storyline, but the book sold so well it was adapted into a 1960 film starring Doris Day and David Niven. The film was later adapted into a 1965-1967 television series starring Patricia Crowley and Mark Miller. Kerr followed up this book with two later best-selling collections, The Snake Has All the Lines and Penny Candy.
Goldilocks is a musical with a book by Jean and Walter Kerr, music by Leroy Anderson, and lyrics by the Kerrs and Joan Ford.
Charles Powell Walters was an American Hollywood director and choreographer most noted for his work in MGM musicals and comedies from the 1940s to the 1960s.
The Caretakers is a 1963 American drama film starring Robert Stack, Polly Bergen, Diane McBain, Joan Crawford and Janis Paige in a story about a mental hospital.
Li'l Abner is a 1959 musical comedy film based on the comic strip of the same name created by Al Capp and the successful Broadway musical of the same name that opened in 1956. The film was produced by Norman Panama and directed by Melvin Frank. It was the second film to be based on the comic strip, the first being RKO's 1940 film, Li'l Abner.
Patricia Crowley is an American actress. She was also frequently billed as Pat Crowley.
Janis Paige is an American retired actress and singer. With a career spanning nearly 60 years, she is one of the last surviving stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood.
Isobel Lennart was an American screenwriter and playwright. She is best known for writing the book for the Broadway musical Funny Girl which premiered in 1964, although she also wrote scripts for successful Hollywood films featuring major stars, some of which received Oscar nominations.
Mark Miller was an American stage and television actor and writer who starred in over 30 plays and made more than forty appearances in television programs and films since 1953. He is best known for his roles as Bill Hooten in Guestward, Ho!, as Jim Nash in the Please Don't Eat the Daisies TV series and as Alvie in the movie he wrote and produced, Savannah Smiles.
Please Don't Eat the Daisies is an American sitcom that aired on NBC from September 14, 1965 to September 2, 1967. The series was based upon the 1957 book by Jean Kerr and the 1960 film starring Doris Day and David Niven.
Follow the Boys is a 1963 American comedy film directed by Richard Thorpe and starring Connie Francis, Paula Prentiss, and Janis Paige, released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Shot on location on the French and Italian Riviera, Follow the Boys was MGM's second film vehicle for top recording artist Francis following Where the Boys Are (1960). While Francis' role in the earlier film had been somewhat secondary, she had a distinctly central role in Follow the Boys playing Bonnie Pulaski, a newlywed traveling the Riviera.
Amy Douglass was an American actress.
Flip Mark is an American film and television actor. He is known for playing the role of Brook Hooten in the American sitcom TV series Guestward, Ho!.