In my university's creative writing studies, workshopping, reading, and constructive criticism were vital parts of my scriptwriting classes, but all of those weren't nearly as pivotal in improving my skills as reading, rewriting, and adapting other scripts in my own time. Through that, I was basically forced to examine characters, tropes, and dynamics all the way down to the last detail, and how said details can make or break a character. Several of my adaptation ideas have sprung from how one kernel of a good idea or truth was in the material, but was surrounded by its mediocre execution, inconsistent tone, dated views, or a lack of greater subtext.
Walter Matthau as Trabucco
Jack Lemmon as Victor Clooney
Dana Elcar as Captain Hubris
Paula Prentiss as Celia Clooney
Klaus Kinski as Dr. Hugo Zuckerbrot
Buddy Buddy was the final cinematic collaboration between writer/director Billy Wilder and screenwriting partner I.A.L. Diamond, who had had monumental success with films such as The Apartment and Some Like It Hot.
Some Like It Shot: Lemmon and Matthau react to the film's disastrous reception.
Notorious Mob hitman Trabucco (Matthau), having just carried out hits on two witnesses in an upcoming court case, finds his third scheduled hit hampered by his encounters with suicidal television censor Victor Clooney (Lemmon).
And that's before getting into Matthau's inexplicably darkened eyebrows.
Between this film and Mixed Nuts (1994), I've become increasingly convinced that American adaptations of dark French comedies simply do not translate to a California setting (something about the spacious beaches, desert, and constant sunshine just kills the constant tension and claustrophobia often necessary for a darker comedy).
Cinematographer Harry Stradling Jr. (McQ) does great with the Riverside, CA setting,
but it just further drives home how ill-suited it is for this material.
The well-proven team of Matthau and Lemmon may yield some chemistry in Buddy Buddy, but with this writing, they come off as quite shallow compared to their previous outings together.
Wilder expressed regret in casting Matthau, citing how an actor like
Clint Eastwood could have lent a more serious tone to Trabucco.
A mistake I also found with Little Miss Marker (1980) is how Buddy Buddy's writing seems to simply "drop" Matthau into its humorless, "dour" lead role without consideration to his strengths as an actor. Trabucco's intentions may be clear and his exasperation with Clooney is understandable, but as is, it's not a good fit for Matthau and with the voice he puts on, it's a touch too cartoonish to fully gel with the world around him, emphasizing the tense state of Clooney in turn. Any attempt to adapt the source material was going to be a challenge, but said cartoonishness isn't great for tonal consistency.
Seriously, I love Jack Lemmon as much as the next guy, but those who dislike his
"Jack Lemmon-ness" will not be swayed by the character of Clooney.
Much like 1993's Last Action Hero (I know...), Buddy Buddy's relative lack of a grounded, established reality leaves the audience unsure when to laugh, if at all. With an increased crassness that was also present in Wilder's The Front Page (1974), and the other aforementioned issues, the film is left with a vacuum where the elements balancing out its dark premise should be.
On a side note, while Prentiss's performance isn't what one would consider "good",
her wackiness is very much welcome given how dull the film is up to that point.
THE STUFF OF TROUBLEMAKING (OR (LITERAL) PAINS IN THE ASS)
It would take a rather large article to describe all the points of awkwardness and lack of connective tissue in Buddy Buddy's script, but here are a few that stood out the most to me on first viewing.
Clooney's hanging attempt breaking the thin hotel water pipe is so obviously telegraphed,
it kills the comedic potential entirely.
The hotel housekeeper (Bette Raya), seeing a tied and gagged Clooney,
makes no attempt to free him, merely propping his chair back up.
Clooney and Trabucco giving a lift to a couple in labor and finding the sex clinic
could have been cut from the script entirely without affecting the main plot.
Celia and Dr. Zuckerbrot's attempt to silence Clooney to save the clinic from embarrassment
goes pretty much nowhere and they just leave the film for good afterwards.
(Also, how screwy does your movie have to be to make Klaus Kinski look like the "straight man"?)
Unlike a lot of other scripts I've come across, for all its apparent faults, Buddy Buddy is not one that brings easy answers for me as far as how I would write it. This is likely due to my comedic sensibilities not skewing as dark as this film or its source material, as well as not wanting to betray what L'emmerdeur writer Francis Veber was going for.
Would you make Trabucco more likable? Drier than Eastwood? Would you make Clooney less desperate? More sympathetic? Would you set clearer "good and bad" moralities so the audience can better figure out who to root for? How would you change the ending?
Spoiler alert: Stromboli, this ain't.
Again, this is a film that for me sparks lots of writing questions, but not so many answers. With better-received dark comedies springing up in the decades since, it can be easy to take them for granted in terms of their execution (no pun intended), but Buddy Buddy proves that even those as talented as Wilder and Diamond can't guarantee a surefire hit in the genre.
Pictured: the original Gil Gunderson.
Given its origins, archetypes, and tropes involved, Buddy Buddy makes for an excellent case study and foundational exercise for any screenwriter. (Though, regretfully, its script cannot currently be viewed online for free as of this writing.)
OTHER OBSERVATIONS
This (and The Pretenders' "Where Has Everybody Gone")
is exactly what that Father Ted episode was missing.
Neile Adams McQueen as the Hotel Saleswoman
Ed Begley Jr. as Lieutenant #1
Happy Gilmore's grandma takes a break from her quilting.
Speaking of Father Ted, Trabucco's Irish priest guise allows Matthau
to speak with an accent not often heard from him.
As if it were the film's "comedic" pièce de résistance, the camera bizarrely zooms
in on Dr. Zuckerbrot's phallic pendant, made from Celia's wedding ring.
Matthau was badly injured performing the film's big laundry chute stunt.
TIDBITS AND SUCH
For all the picking-apart I've done with this film, I do have a soft spot for one of its U.S. posters (above). If only Clooney were as sweet and happy-go-lucky as the poster portrayed.
One aspect I found working like a well-oiled machine in Buddy Buddy is Lalo Schifrin's score, which is both classic-sounding and highly irreverent, fitting the film's tone (whether you think the film stuck the landing with it or not).
Having been out of print in North America for decades, Buddy Buddy is currently available to watch on YouTube.
Buddy Buddy is the comedic cousin to The Mirror Crack'd in terms of being a failed adaptation despite all the talent involved, but to even this writer's surprise, it's still not the worst Matthau and Lemmon film out there. (Thanks, Odd Couple II!)
"Can two divorced men carry out a Mob hit without driving each other crazy?"
Copyright © Chynna Moore
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