| The Nutty Professor | |
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Original theatrical poster |
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| Directed by | Jerry Lewis |
| Produced by | Ernest D. Glucksman Arthur P. Schmidt Jerry Lewis |
| Screenplay by | Jerry Lewis Bill Richmond |
| Story by | Robert Louis Stevenson |
| Starring | Jerry Lewis Stella Stevens Del Moore Kathleen Freeman |
| Music by | Walter Scharf Les Brown and His Band of Renown |
| Cinematography | W. Wallace Kelley |
| Editing by | John Woodcock |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
| Release date(s) | June 4, 1963 |
| Running time | 107 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
The Nutty Professor is a 1963 Paramount Pictures science fiction comedy feature film produced, directed, co-written (with Bill Richmond) and starring Jerry Lewis. The score was composed by Walter Scharf.
In 2004, The Nutty Professor was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
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Professor Julius Kelp (Jerry Lewis), is a nerdy, unkempt, buck-toothed, introverted, accident prone, socially inept university professor whose experiments in the classroom laboratory are less than successful...and hilariously destructive. When a football-playing bully humiliates and assaults him, Kelp decides to "beef up" by joining a local gym. Kemp's failure to succeed in the gym prompts him to invent a serum that turns him into the handsome, extremely smooth, cool, and obnoxious girl-chasing hipster, Buddy Love. (Lewis said that the two represented good and evil.[1])
This new found persona gives him the confidence to pursue one of his students, Stella Purdy (Stella Stevens). Although she despises Love, she finds herself strangely attracted to him. Buddy wows the crowd with his jazzy, breezy musical delivery and cool demeanor at the Purple Pit, a nightclub where the students hang out. The formula wears off at inopportune times, often to Kelp's embarrassment.
Although Kelp knows that his alternate persona is an arrogant person, he cannot prevent himself from continually taking the formula as he enjoys the attention that Love receives. As Buddy performs at the annual student dance the formula starts to wear off. His real identity now revealed, Kelp gives an impassioned speech, admitting his mistakes and seeking forgiveness. Kelp says that the one thing he learned from being someone else is that if you don't like yourself, you can't expect others to like you. Purdy meets Kelp backstage, and confesses that she prefers Kelp over Buddy Love.
The film ends with Kelp's formerly henpecked father choosing to market the formula (a copy of which Kelp had sent to his parent's home for safekeeping), endorsed by the strait-laced Dean of the college who proclaims, "It's a gasser!" Kelp's father makes a pitch to the chemistry class, and the students all rush forward to buy the new tonic. In the confusion Kelp and Purdy slip out of the class. Armed with a marriage license and two bottles of the formula, they elope.
The Nutty Professor was filmed from October 9-December 17, 1962 and is a parody of Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
The Alaskan Polar Bear Heater is a cocktail featured in the film. Buddy Love instructs the bartender (Buddy Lester) on how to make it: two shots of vodka, a little rum, some bitters, a smidgen of vinegar, a shot of vermouth, a shot of gin, a little brandy, a lemon peel, orange peel, cherry, some more scotch. At one point during the instructions, the bartender quips "You going to drink this here, or are you going to take it home and rub it on your chest?"[2]
Love instructs the bartender to "mix it nice" and pour it into a tall glass. The bartender asks if he can take a sip; after doing so, he freezes like a statue. While the drink started as fictional, it is now listed among real drinks.[3][4][5]
The Nutty Professor was filmed mostly on the campus of Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ) in 1962.
American Film Institute recognition
The Nutty Professor was released on DVD in October 2000. In October 2004 a "Special Edition" was released including a commentary by Lewis and Steve Lawrence, a documentary and a short feature. In the commentary Lewis discusses aspects of production, including his creating a real-time, on-camera monitor, which subsequently became standard in the film industry. He mentions that he recut the film for his own home viewing. He notes places where he would like to redo the scene, for example making the professor's watch sound tinny.
An animated direct-to-video sequel, The Nutty Professor starring Jerry Lewis and Drake Bell was released November 25, 2008. Directed by Paul Taylor, the film involves Julius Kelp's teenage grandson Harold Kelp discovering his grandfather's secret formula and unleashing his alter-ego. Lewis has for decades talked about doing a sequel and until now had to settle for the remake starring Eddie Murphy. Murphy did a sequel called Nutty Professor II: The Klumps.
On June 29, 2009, the New York Times reported that a Broadway musical version of the movie is planned. Jerry Lewis is set to direct, with music by Marvin Hamlisch and lyrics and book by Rupert Holmes.[6]
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