LOST IN A HAREM
US, 1944, 89 minutes. Black and white.
Bud Abbott, Lou Costello, Marilyn Maxwell, John Conti, Douglass Dumbrille, Jimmy Dorsey and his Orchestra.
Directed by Charles Reisner.
Lost in a Harem is an Abbott and Costello comedy made at MGM (where they had appeared with Kathryn Grayson and John Carroll in Rio Rita).
This film has a contemporary setting. Abbott and Costello play two bumbling magicians. They are in an Islamic country in the Middle East (and in hindsight, it indicates that Hollywood in 1944 had absolutely no idea what an Islamic country was like, its customs, its style).
A prince approaches them to get help to gain the throne from his uncle (Douglass Dumbrille who had appeared as the villain in the Marx Brothers’ The Big Store, directed by Reisner). The prince is also infatuated with a nightclub singer played by Marilyn Maxwell who is a friend of the two magicians.
The film opens in a very western nightclub, with behaviour from the Islamic men that would not be tolerated in later decades.
Most of the film takes place in the palace of the despotic uncle, with his plans to consolidate his place on the throne, get rid of his nephew. However, he becomes entangled with Abbott and Costello who are let loose in the palace, in the harem, finding all kinds of allies, including some of the despot’s wives who have remarkable American accents and background.
As with Abbott and Costello films, there is a lot of slapstick comedy which appeals to their fans. The other aspect of Abbott and Costello comedy is verbal humour, the mixing up of words, the playing on words, the use of puns and repartee which gets entangled with the words. There are plenty of examples in this film as well.
John Grant was credited as supplying dialogue for Abbott and Costello in Rio Rita and Lost in a Harem – and he contributes very strongly to the type of verbal humour that became one of their hallmarks. Grant was a writer and adviser on most of the Abbott and Costello films – and his entry in the Internet Movie Database lists all these films and indicates how strong a career he had supplying humorous material to the comedy double.
Lost in a Harem is worth seeing only as an upmarket example of Abbott and Costello films.
