Young Frankenstein / The Palace / Encore & Blue Bar at the Wyndham

Young Frankenstein
The Palace
Playhouse Square Cinema (https://www.playhousesquare.org/cinema) - Free Showing
USA, 1974, Mel Brooks, 20th Century Fox
Black and White, 106 minutes

A young neurosurgeon (Gene Wilder) inherits the castle of his grandfather, the famous Dr. Victor von Frankenstein. In the castle he finds a funny hunchback called Igor (Marty Feldman), the grandson of the Igor who assisted Victor Frankenstein, and Inga (Teri Garr), an attractive lab assistant and an old housekeeper, Frau Blücher (Cloris Leachman)! Young Frankenstein believes that the work of his grandfather is only crap, but when he discovers the book where the mad doctor described his reanimation experiment, he suddenly changes his mind...

https://www.wyndham.com/cms_content/hotels/CLEPS/images/hero.jpg5:15 p.m. Dinner - Encore and the Blue Bar at the Wyndham. We’ll have a reserved table in the highly regarded Encore restaurant with arrangements to order from the dinner ($18 to $30) or lounge menus (a la carte $10 and under) for lighter appetites.

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** Please let us know your dinner plans on your RSVP so that we can either save you a seat at the "Movie Group" table or plan to meet you at the movie. Cash is highly recommended. Arrangements have been made for separate checks including a standard gratuity. **

7:30 p.m. Movie at The Palace on Playhouse Square
There may be a line or que for tickets as this is a free showing and advance reservations are not offered. I arranged to pick up our tickets in advance so that we will bypass the que at the ticket window. This is a special accommodation for our group - those with YES rsvp's only. Meet at the no later than 7:15 p.m. precisely. If you arrive later, you will be responsible for tickets on your own as we will be in our seats. The film is 106 minutes, so expect to be out around 9 p.m.

After film discussion: Since this is a work night any after film meeting will be ad hoc.

As a kick-off to Cinema at the Square a series of 15 blockbuster films, this showing is FREE! Those attending dinner may register for some giveaways to promote the October production of the Broadway hit "Young Frankenstein the Musical." The Playhouse Square web site hinted at special events that could not be confirmed at posting time.

The film will be shown on the Palace Theater’s famous screen, a 20 foot-high by 47 foot-wide super Hurly-Glo projection screen. It's billed as the largest (non-Imax screen) in Ohio.

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Moviegoers will be treated to pre-show organ recitals on a restored 1928 Kimball organ that contains 13 sets of pipes, a xylophone, Glockenspiel, a complete set of drums and many cymbals. The organ, donated to Playhouse Square in 1975, was painstakingly restored by volunteers and is the perfect complement to your evening at Cinema at the Square!

Synopsis, synapses
Mel Brooks is Hollywood’s greatest spoof-meister, and Young Frankenstein may be his funniest movie. Shot in gorgeous black and white with the same sets and the same feel as the classics Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, it’s a loving send-up, with sophisticated style, hilarious dialog, inspired silliness and broad physical humor.

You don’t have to watch the two original Frankenstein films to enjoy Young Frankenstein, but you should. They'll help you appreciate the painstaking visual homage, and refresh your memory of the scenes and plot lines Brooks sends up with such delight.
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The Plot
Gene Wilder is the serious young Dr. Frankenstein who rejects the work of his crazy grandfather, Baron von Frankenstein, and insists everyone pronounce his name “Frahnk-en-schteen.” But when he inherits the old family castle, the promising young doctor is intrigued, and off he goes to Transylvania.
After following clues left by the housekeeper, he reads his grandfather’s diaries, and starts to think his grandfather’s mad dream of reanimating dead flesh just…could… work!

The Cast of Young Frankenstein
Spoofs work best played straight, and Wilder is pitch perfect as the young Frankenstein, sliding from earnest, arrogant young doctor into classic mad scientist mode. Even his hair goes insane. Peter Boyle (Everyone Loves Raymond) makes a terrific, hulking Monster, managing to emote under the monster makeup, with his bolted neck and clumsy elevator boots. Their “Puttin’ on the Ritz” is the tap dance to end all Hollywood hoofer duets.
Wilder earns huge props as the screenwriter, and he and Boyle are hilarious, but the supporting cast runs away with the movie.
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Marty Feldman is Igor (that’s EYE-gor), the goggle-eyed family retainer whose hump keeps migrating from one side of his back to the other, and Teri Garr is wide-eyed and kittenish as the slightly dim lab assistant. Cloris Leachman is genius as the fierce housekeeper Frau Blüecher (cue frightened horses), revealing her relationship with Grandpa Frankentein: “Yes! Yes! He vas my…boyfriend!”

Madeleine Kahn shines as Wilder’s frigid fiance, who thaws into a lioness after her abduction by the Monster, and winds up looking a lot like Elsa Lanchester in The Bride of Frankenstein. In a send-up of a touching scene in the original Frankenstein movie, Gene Hackman plays a blind man who invites the Monster to share his humble dinner and is a bit off the mark with his serving skills. The physical comedy is priceless.

Add in frightened townspeople with pitchforks and a bürgomeister who looks suspiciously like Dr. Strangelove, and there stands one of the greatest ensemble casts in the history of spoofs.

The whole film is shot in Black and white to simulate the old monster movie feeling. Approx. 106 minutes.

Trailer: Young Frankenstein Trailer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOPTriLG5cU)

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REVIEW
Mel Brooks's follow-up to his enormously successful western spoof, BLAZING SADDLES, tackles the horror genre--specifically, FRANKENSTEIN and THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN. This time Brooks tones down his broad humor a bit to create a work that is both an affectionate parody and a knowlegeable homage to its cinematic forebears. Gene Wilder plays Dr. Frederick Frankenstein (now defiantly pronounced "FRONK-en-steen"), a med school lecturer who thinks his infamous grandfather's work is "doo-doo." The younger Frankenstein must finally face his destiny when he inherits his grandfather's Transylvanian estate. Once there, he meets Igor (pronounced "eye-gore" and played by the eye-popping Marty Feldman), whose hunchback inexplicably changes from the left side to the right throughout the movie; Inga (Teri Garr), a young woman who will assist the doctor; and Frau Blücher (Cloris Leachman), a hideous old woman who causes horses to whinny in fright at the mere mention of her name. Eventually, Frederick finds his grandfather's private library and a copy of his book, How I Did It. Of course, Frederick cannot keep himself from righting his grandfather's wrongs and creating a new monster (Peter Boyle), a big, dumb corpse with a zipper round his neck and an abnormal brain in his head. The laughs come along at a fast and furious rate. One of the film's highlights is the "Puttin' on the Ritz" duet performed by Frederick and the Monster.

YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN is Brooks's most accomplished work, combining his well-known brand of comedy with stylish direction and a uniformly excellent cast. The handsome black-and-white cinematography really captures the look of an early 1930s film. The direction achieves a seemingly impossible task, balancing Brooks's off-the-wall humor within the framework of the style of a classic Universal Frankenstein film. The Frankenstein castle, with its cobwebs, dust, skulls, original lab equipment, and strange goings-on, could easily have been inhabited by Boris Karloff or Bela Lugosi. Wilder, wildly funny here, later attempted his own genre spoof, HAUNTED HONEYMOON, which came nowhere near YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN. – TV Guide

FEE
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MOVIE LINKS:

PARKING:
Playhouse Square Parking (https://www.playhousesquare.org/PlanMyVisit/PlanMyVisit.aspx?ID=18)

Map of Playhouse Square District (https://www.playhousesquare.org/minisites/planmyvisit/newdistrictmap.pdf)

Movie Reviews. https://www.rottentoma... (https://www.rottentomatoes.com/)