Walter Slezak Movies
The son of legendary opera star Leo Slezak, Walter Slezak was a medical student before settling into the comfortable position of bank clerk. Slezak was coerced by his friend, actor/director Michael Curtiz, to accept an acting role in Curtiz's 1922 spectacular Sodom and Gomorrah -- and with this film, Slezak's career in the world of finance came to an end. Those familiar with Walter Slezak only as the corpulent supporting player in such films as Sinbad the Sailor (1947), People Will Talk (1951), and Emil and the Detectives (1964) will be surprised upon viewing Slezak's appearances as a slim, romantic leading man in his German silent films. Unable to keep his weight under control, Slezak decided around 1930 to become a character actor. He made his Broadway debut in the 1930 production Meet My Sister. After 12 years of stage work, Slezak was cast in his first American film, 1942's Once Upon a Honeymoon, playing the fifth-columnist husband of social-climbing Ginger Rogers. Equally adept at comedy and villainy, Slezak was able to combine these two extremes in such films as The Princess and the Pirate (1944) and The Inspector General (1949). Occasionally returning to the stage in the 1950s, Slezak won a Tony award for his portrayal of Cesar in the 1955 musical Fanny, and in 1957 followed in his father's footsteps by singing at the Metropolitan Opera. His TV assignments included the role of the Clock King on Batman (1966-1967). Slezak's 1962 autobiography What Time Is the Next Swan? derived its title from the punch line of an apocryphal story involving his father. At the age of 80, despondent over his many illnesses, Slezak committed suicide in his Beverly Hills home. Walter Slezak was the father of actress Erika Slezak, best known for her continuing role on the ABC soap opera One Life to Live. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi- 1976
Walter Slezak plays Dr. Coppelius in this misleading titled fantasy feature. Not a horror flick as one might assume, The Mysterious House of Dr. C is a respectable adaptation of Ted and JoAnna Kneeland's ballet Coppelia. The non-dancing Slezak plays a daffy but essentially decent inventor who creates a "clockwork girl," who comes to life in the form of lovely American ballet star Claudia Corday. As the life-sized doll Swanilda, Corday is paired with Caj Selling of the Royal Swedish Ballet. A few beguiling animated sequences add icing to this spooky but nonthreatening confection. Mysterious House of Dr. C was one of a handful of films produced by Samuel Bronston after his fall from grace as King of the Historical Epics (El Cid, Fall of the Roman Empire, et. al.) ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Walter Slezak, Claudia Corday, (more)
- 1972
This 1972 international production of Treasure Island is one of many film versions of the classic adventure by Robert Louis Stevenson. Kim Burfield plays Jim Hawkins, a young man who works at a pub with his mother (Maria Rohm). When drunken old sailor Billy Bones (Lionel Stander) comes in for a drink and dies, Jim gets his hands on an old pirate's treasure map. He then enlists the help of Squire Trelawney (Walter Slezak) and Dr. Livesey (Angel DelPozo) to join him locate the island on the map. They join the ship lead by Captain Smollett (Rik Battaglia). The ship's cook, Long John Silver (Orson Welles), has convinced the rest of the crew to organize a mutiny in order to keep the riches for themselves. This adaptation of Treasure Island was released in several different language versions, each with a different director. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi
- Starring:
- Orson Welles, Kim Burfield, (more)
This internationally produced adaptation of Anna Sewell's Black Beauty is essentially a vehicle for Oliver star Mark Lester. The young Lester spends most of the film trying to reclaim his beautiful black horse, which passes through several hands over the course of 90 minutes. All the setpieces of the Sewell original are in attendance, including the showstopping "burning barn" sequence. Walter Slezak is the only truly recognizable actor in the film outside of Lester. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Mark Lester, Uschi Glas, (more)
- 1968
The grand ballet Coppelia is familiar to most dedicated dance aficionados. This film uses the music and some of the story of the ballet but focuses on the inventor of the marvelous mechanical doll of the story, Dr. Coppelius (played by actor Walter Slezak), rather than on the doll itself, Coppelia. However, a substantial portion of the original ballet is incorporated into the story, most notably by Claudia Corday of the Harkness Ballet as Coppelia, and Caj Selling of the Royal Swedish Ballet as Franz. The orchestra and corps de ballet of the Gran Teatro del Liceo de Barcelona provides the essential musical and dance support. If reports are correct, this film adapts the original ballet into something approaching a musical comedy format. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi
- Starring:
- Walter Slezak, Claudia Corday, (more)
- 1967
Career bank robber Peter Churchman Stephen Boyd plans to retire from his life of crime and live the good life in this uninspired crime thriller. He is blackmailed by Angela Tresler Giovanna Ralli into pulling off one last heist of some precious jewels located in the bank in Pamplona, Spain. Peter and three accomplices must steal the jewels during the annual running of the bulls. The festival atmosphere will hopefully allow them to pull off the crime, but the bank is located directly across the street from the local police station. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi
- Starring:
- Stephen Boyd, Yvette Mimieux, (more)
- 1966
This all-star crime caper stars Mickey Rooney as an American airline purser whose greed gets the better of him. During a 24-hour layover in Beirut, he transports a cache of stolen goods, which brings him to the attention of a smuggler (Walter Slezak). Lex Barker is the pilot who reluctantly tries to bail the avaricious Rooney out. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1965
A Very Special Favor stars Rock Hudson as a notorious romeo and Leslie Caron as a prudish psychiatrist. At the urging of Caron's lawyer father Charles Boyer, Hudson begins a seduction campaign. Caron resents this intrusion in her private affairs and builds up a wall of resistance against the ardent Mr. Hudson. Still, the film ends with Hudson and Caron happily married, with plenty of children underfoot and another one on the way. Roundly panned for its alleged smarminess in 1965, A Very Special Favor is offensive today not for its sex talk but for its "pregnant, barefoot, in-the-kitchen" mentality. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Rock Hudson, Leslie Caron, (more)
- 1964
In this musical comedy, a popular singer and his band find themselves stuck in the Canary Islands. While there a neurotic filmmaker brings his cast and crew to make a film. The singer ends up falling for the leading lady and decides to make a musical version of the film on the sly using the other director's equipment. Both pictures are lousy until the two filmmakers team up and combine them. A smash hit is born. Songs include: "Wonderful Life," "A Girl in Every Port," "Home," "A Little Imagination," "On the Beach," "In the Stars," "We Love a Movie," "Do You Remember," "What I Gotta Do," "All Kinds of People," "A Matter of Moments," "Youth and Experience" (performed by Richard and the Shadows), "Theme from Young Lovers," and "Walkin"' (performed by the Shadows). ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- Starring:
- Cliff Richard, Walter Slezak, (more)
- 1964
Erich Kastner's oft-filmed children's story Emil and the Detectives was given the Disney treatment in 1964. Though the plot is still set in Berlin, the younger characters have been extensively Americanized, none more so than the title character (played by Bryan Russell) and aspiring teenaged detective Gustav (Roger Mobley). Travelling by bus to visit his aunt, Emil loses an envelope of money to sneak thief Grundeis (Heinz Schubert). The boy enlists the aid of a gang of young detective-story aficionados, led by Gustav, to locate the thief. This leads to a perilous adventure when it turns out that Grundeis is in league with an erudite master criminal known as The Baron (Walter Slezak), who is planning a major heist. The film waves uncertainly between pure-and-simple kiddie entertainment and a dead-serious "caper" effort; surely some of the worldly, cynical dialogue spoken by Walter Slezak went way over the heads of Disney's 8-to-14-year-old target audience. Still, the performances are lively and the Berlin locations well chosen. Emil and the Detectives wasn't as successful as Disney's previous release Mary Poppins, but it managed to make back its cost overseas. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Walter Slezak, Bryan Russell, (more)
- 1962
This long, 135-minute feature is divided into four different segments, three highlighting fairy tales and the first introducing the two Brothers Grimm. Wilhelm (Laurence Harvey) is the dreamer, and Jacob (Karl Boehm) is the practical one, and between them, some marvelous fairy tales develop. Seguing into the first tale about the "Dancing Princess," co-directors Henry Levin and George Pal -- also the producer -- allow their special-effects artists full rein. In-between dancing, the princess (Yvette Mimieux) falls in love with a charming woodsman (Russ Tamblyn). In the second story about the "Cobbler and the Elves," a Christmas miracle of dedicated labor helps the cobbler out when he most needs it. In the last story, a fire-breathing dragon threatens the kingdom until a lowly servant (Buddy Hackett) saves the day. One of the highlights of this production are the Puppetoons, and another is Cinerama -- three projectors working to create a three-paneled (sometimes visibly so), wide-screen panorama. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Laurence Harvey, Claire Bloom, (more)
Rock Hudson stars in this frothy romantic comedy as filthy-rich American Robert Talbot. Talbot owns an Italian villa, where he traditionally stays only one month out of the year (September), but when Talbot suddenly decides to show up in July, Talbot's major overseer Maurice (Walter Slezak) is shocked out of his skin to see him -- it seems that Maurice has turned Talbot's villa into a hotel for the remaining eleven months of the year. But it's July in Italy, and love is in the air, and Talbot becomes distracted by the beautiful Lisa (Gina Lollobrigida) and soon he is trying to prevent her from marrying another man. Sandra Dee and Bobby Darin (in his first screen role) play young guests of the villa. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi
- Starring:
- Rock Hudson, Gina Lollobrigida, (more)
- 1959
Whatever the "miracle" is in this story, set back in the 19th century, it tends to be buried underneath the multiple romances of the heroine Teresa (Carroll Baker), a woman who leaves the convent to find one specific man. Teresa falls in love with Michael (Roger Moore) a dashing Englishman in the British army that is fighting Napoleon in Spain. She opts for leaving the cloister to find her love. Meanwhile, during her absence, a statue of the Virgin Mary comes to life and takes her place in the convent, hence the "miracle" of the title. Along her journey, Teresa meets and eventually marries a handsome gypsy (Vittorio Gassman) who comes to an unhappy end. Widowed and grieving, young Teresa next becomes enamored of a bullfighter (Gustavo Rojo) whose luck in the ring ends tragically one day. At this point, it would seem the cloister was a better offer, but Teresa continues in her journey to find Michael. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
- Starring:
- Carroll Baker, Roger Moore, (more)
- 1957
Dean Martin's first solo film after his split with Jerry Lewis was very nearly his last. Dino plays Ray Hunter, a Conrad Hiltonesque playboy hotelier at large in Rome. Taking charge of his latest acquisition -- a huge hotel with the titular 10,000 bedrooms -- Hunter finds himself being pursued by the daughters of wealthy Vittori Martelli (Walter Slezak). For a while, it looks as though the youngest daughter Nina (Anna Maria Alberghetti) has the inside track, but big-hearted Ray, realizing that Nina would be happier with a boy her own age, settles for older sister Maria (Eva Bartok). The poor box-office take for this old-fashioned musical comedy seemed at the time to foretell the end of Dean Martin's film career, but he was rescued by his well-received appearance in The Young Lions. The funniest aspect of Ten Thousand Bedrooms was its promotional trailer, narrated by Teddi Thurman, then famous as the sultry weather girl on the weekend radio series Monitor. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Dean Martin, Anna Maria Alberghetti, (more)
- 1954
Like its predecessor Duffy of San Quentin, The Steel Cage is made up of episodes from a never-telecast TV series based on the career of progressive prison warden Clinton T. Duffy. Paul Kelly plays Duffy, while his wife is portrayed by Maureen O'Sullivan. Divided into three separate playlets, the film begins with the semi-comic story of an ill-tempered chef (Walter Slezak) who is railroaded into San Quentin by a gourmet prisoner. The second story concerns a tense hostage situation fomented by would-be escapees John Ireland and Lawrence Tierney. The closing story deals with an incarcerated painter (Kenneth Tobey), whose belief in God is renewed by an idealistic young priest (Arthur Franz). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Paul Kelly, Maureen O'Sullivan, (more)
- 1953
Confidentially Connie is an MGM factory product starring Janet Leigh and Van Johnson. Upon learning she is pregnant, Leigh tries to convince her husband Johnson, a humble teacher, to find a better-paying job. But Johnson is a proud man, so much so that he refuses to request money from his wealthy father (Louis Calhern). Somehow this plotline was related to the dilemma of rising meat prices in the postwar era. In the 1930s, MGM would have stretched Confidentially Connie well past its welcome, say for about 100 minutes; but 1953 was a year of austerity, thus this harmless little comedy breezed along at 74 minutes. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Van Johnson, Janet Leigh, (more)
- 1953
Filmed on location, White Witch Doctor is set in the Belgian Congo, circa 1907. Professional hunter Lonni Douglas (Robert Mitchum) is hired by nurse Ellen Burton (Susan Hayward) to escort her into the African interior, in hopes of finding her former mentor. Eventually they discover that the man Burton seeks has died, but Burton decides to stay around for awhile and tend to the wounds of the local witch doctor's injured son -- and, incidentally, to convince the tribesmen that "white man's medicine" is a good thing. Unfortunately, Douglas' avaricious partner Huysman (Walter Slezak) endangers the lives of himself, Douglas and Burton by going on a forbidden hunt for gold. Based on a novel by Louise A. Steindorf, White Witch Doctor is distinguished by Bernard Herrmann's evocative musical score, wherein genuine African musical instruments are utilized. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Susan Hayward, Robert Mitchum, (more)
Ethel Merman reprised her role as a socialite turned diplomat in this screen adaptation of Irving Berlin's hit Broadway musical. Sally Adams (Merman) has made it her business to know everyone worth knowing in Washington D.C., and her penchant for parties pays off when she's appointed United States Ambassador to Lichtenburg. Once she is installed in her new position, she falls in love with suave Foreign Minister Cosmo Constantine (George Sanders), while Princess Maria (Vera-Ellen) has her head turned by Sally's press attaché, Kenneth (Donand O'Connor). Call Me Madam is a showcase for Merman's roof-raising musical comedy style, and here she gets to sing a handful of Berlin tunes, including "You're Just In Love," "Can You Use Any Money Today?" and "Hostess With The Mostes' on the Ball." Vera-Ellen's singing was dubbed by Carol Richards. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Ethel Merman, Donald O'Connor, (more)
People Will Talk was less a movie than a conduit for the genteel liberalism of screenwriter/director Joseph M. Mankiewicz. Cary Grant plays Dr. Praetorius, an unorthodox medical professor at a sedate midwestern college who seems more interested in the human soul than in the cold facts of the human body. Praetorius' nemesis is a conservative rival doctor (Hume Cronyn) who presses for an investigation of our hero's clouded past--with special emphasis given the mysterious old man (Finlay Currie) who lives with Praetorius and waits on him hand and foot. In the course of the film, Praetorius falls in love with one of his students, an unmarried pregnant girl (Jeanne Crain). At the climactic hearing concerning Praetorius' fitness, the presiding judge (Basil Ruysdael) decides that Praetorius' "modern" methods are more worthwhile than the pragmatic, cut-and-dried theories of his enemies. Based on a German play by Curt Goetz, People Will Talk is a bit too proud of its own cleverness, with Mankiewicz' political planks being wedged in at all the inappropriate times (while conversing with the father of the pregnant girl, Praetorius launches on a gratuitous attack against farm subsidies!) Still, the film is ten times more intelligent than most of Hollywood's 1951 output, and contains one of Cary Grant's best and subtlest seriocomic performances. Bonus: In the first scene of People Will Talk, the snoopy lady who brings Praetorius' "shady" past to the attention of Hume Cronyn is played by an uncredited Margaret ("Wicked Witch of the West") Hamilton. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Cary Grant, Jeanne Crain, (more)
Forget what you've been led to believe: Bedtime for Bonzo is a most enjoyable film, and Ronald Reagan is not outacted by the chimpanzee. Reagan is cast as psychology professor whose reputation is sullied by the fact that his father was a convict. To prove that environment rather than heredity dictates a man's personality, Reagan uses Bonzo the chimp to test out his theories. The hairy little guy seems to be responding to the kindnesses lavished upon him--and then he is accused of robbery. Reagan nearly goes to jail in Bonzo's stead, but everything turns out all right in the end (we're not giving anything away; after all, everybody knows that there was a Bonzo Goes to College in 1952). While it's an uphill climb, Ronald Reagan and his able costars Diana Lynn and Walter Slezak manage to keep Bonzo from running away with the picture. And yes, director Fred DeCordova is the same guy who produced Johnny Carson's late-night show in the 1980s and 1990s. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Diana Lynn, Walter Slezak, (more)
- 1950
Roger Quain (Howard Duff) arrives in Europe to look after the welfare of two zoo-bound black panthers. Catherine Ulven (Marta Toren), a secret agent for an unnamed country, decides to smuggle a valuable piece of film to America by hiding it in the collar of one of the big cats. If it were this easy, the film would be over in ten minutes. Instead, enemy agents Denson (Philip Friend), Paradou (Robert Douglas) and Kopel (Dorn) target Roger, Catherine, and the panthers for extermination. Thus the stage is set for a thrill-packed pursuit through the mountains of Switzerland. Spy Hunt is based on the somewhat more credible novel Panther's Moon by Victor Canning. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Howard Duff, Märta Torén, (more)
- 1950
Bud Abbott and Lou Costello play wrestling promoters whose star attraction, Wee Willie Davis, skips town to return to his home in Arabia. While scouring the desert in search of Davis, Bud and Lou inadvertently purchase slave girl Patricia Medina, and with equal inadvertence join the Foreign Legion. In their own bumbling, inept fashion, our heroes manage to foil a desert uprising fomented by shiek Douglas Dumbrille and traitorous Legion commandant Walter Slezak. The film's highlights include an opening-scene parody of pre-rehearsed wrestling matches, a "mirage" routine capped by one of the hoariest vaudeville punchlines in history, and a runaway-jeep climax. All in all, however, Abbott & Costello in the Foreign Legion is one of the team's lesser efforts. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, (more)
- 1950
Obviously inspired by the success of Red Skelton's The Fuller Brush Man, The Yellow Cab Man stars Skelton as a Rube Goldberg-type inventor who can't seem to stay out of trouble. He also can't hold down a job, either, much to the consternation of girl friend Gloria De Haven. Through the auspices of cab driver James Gleason, Red is hired by the Yellow Cab company, nearly losing his job on the very first day when he gets mixed up in a chaotic wedding reception (in her last feature film appearance, Polly Moran is screamingly funny as the bride's mother). It's all over for Red when he attempts to demonstrate his latest invention, break-proof glass-resulting in a bad bop on the noggin for boss Paul Harvey. Our hero redeems himself by capturing a gang of crooks (among them Walter Slezak and Ray Collins) in an elaborate slapstick finale involving a revolving model home, a hypodermic-shooting toaster, a helium-filled balloon, and a Tarzan-like swing from the rafters of an empty warehouse. Halfway through The Yellow Cab Man, there's an amusing precursor to the "LSD Trip" films of the 1960s, as a drug-benumbed Red Skelton experiences a series of surrealistic dreams. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Red Skelton, Gloria de Haven, (more)
The satirical bite of Gogol's play The Government Inspector is dispensed with in favor of traditional Danny Kaye buffoonery in The Inspector General. Kaye plays the illiterate stooge of two-bit medicine-show- entrepreneur Walter Slezak. Abandoned by Slezak, the starving Kaye wanders into a corruption-ridden Russian village, which is all geared up for a visit from the Inspector General. Mistaking Kaye for that selfsame royal inspector, the townsfolk fawn on the confused Kaye, granting him his every whim and plying him with all sorts of bribes. In the original Gogol play, the boorish phony inspector takes advantage of the villagers' error by laying waste to the town and seducing a few local maidens; in the film, Kaye is as pure as the driven borscht, as is his true love (Barbara Bates), the only honest person in town. The treachery is in the hands of Slezak, who fakes Kaye's death and tries to blackmail the crooked local officials. The deus-ex-machina arrival of the real Inspector General foils the crooks and places the nonplused Kaye in the job of town mayor. Those of you who read the play in college may remember it ends with everyone frozen in horror when the genuine inspector shows up, with Gogol's stage directions insisting that the actors hold their fearful poses for a full sixty seconds. Be assured that in the film version of Inspector General, nothing stands still--least of all Danny Kaye, who cuts quite a swath through several Sylvia Fine/Johnny Mercer specialty songs. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- Starring:
- Danny Kaye, Walter Slezak, (more)
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