Classic 60s Movie: The Loved One
January was Classic 60s Movie month. Today bonus guest post comes from W. H. Morris.
Movie Title: The Loved One
Year: 1966
Writers: Evelyn Waugh, novel, Terry Southern and Christopher Isherwood, screenplay
Lead Actors: Robert Morse, Jonathan Winters, Sir John Geilgud, Anjanette Comer
Director: Tony Richardson
Plot Summary: A young unemployed British poet, Dennis Barlow (Robert Morse), travels to Los Angeles to visit his uncle, Sir Francis Hinsely (Sir John Gieguld) who commits suicide after loosing his job at a movie studio. When urged by the leader of the local British community, Sir Ambrose Abercrombie, played by Robert Morley, to spare no expense for the funeral Barlow finds himself at the vast and grossly ornate mortuary/cemetery, Whispering Glades, dedicated to the glorification of death, operated by Rev. Wilbur Glenworthy (Jonathan Winters in a dual role.). There he meets Aimee Thanatogenous (portrayed with marvelously delicate innocence by Anjanette Comer), a make-up artist for corpses, and while touring Whispering Glades falls for her.
Following Sir Francis’ funeral Barlow pursues Miss Thanatogenis who is also also pursued by Lafayette “Laff” Joyboy, (Rod Steiger), the Chief Mortician at Whispering Glades. While courting Aimee Dennis goes to work at Happy Hunting Grounds, a pet cemetery, owned by Rev. Glenworthy and operated by his hard-luck brother Henry, ( Jonathan Winter’s second role). There Dennis progresses from picking up the remains of dead pets and storing them in the office refrigerator along with the employees’ lunches to non-sectarian pet funeral minister.
Meantime with both Dennis and Mr. Joyboy competing for her affections Aimee becomes confused and seeks advice by writing to Guru Brahmin a newspaper advice columnist (played with gravely inebriation by character actor Lionel Stander) His replies only compound her confusion.
Back at Happy Hunting Grounds a thirteen year old rocketeer (Paul Williams)crashes a rocket into the cremation furnace which gives Henry Glenworthy an idea about what his brother Wilbur can do to clear whispering Glades of the interred loved ones.
As Dennis and Mr. Joyboy continue pursuing Aimee’ Rev. Glenworthy offers her a promotion to become the first female embalmer at Whispering Glades. Aimee is delighted but when she meets him alone he reveals his more earthly ambitions for her. Confused from running both from and to men and despairing that she will never find love Aimee’ seeks consolation in person from Guru Brahmin. The Guru proves to be a boozy old letch who tells her to go jump out a window. With no real care Aimee Thanatogenis has become The Unloved One. When she realizes this she calmly returns to Whispering Glades and goes to Mr. Joyboy’s embalming station and finally embracing her real true love, Death, commits suicide.
The conclusion finds Rev. Glenworthy launching into space Aimee’s remains while announcing on national television a new era in funeral services where he will fling the departed to the stars.
Why I Think This Is A Classic 60s Movie: The surge of iconoclastic music and art which characterized the Sixties is no better represented than by The Loved One.
With A Best Picture Oscar 1963 for Tom Jones which had featured Albert Finney and Susannah York in a notoriously lusty, gluttonous seduction scene, Director Tony Richardson could film anything he wished. When he learned that cinematographer Haskell Wexler and Producer John Calley both had a strong interest in turning British satirical novelist Evelyn Waugh’s novel The Loved One into a film Richardson’s abiding taste for the outrageous was piqued.
Waugh had written the novel after a visit to Hollywood to discuss the filming of his novel Brideshead Revisited which did not happen. What did result was The Loved One, his deft skewering of Hollywood insincerity and excess and particularly the death industry located in Los Angeles.
Richardson had been a part of Britain’s Angry Young Men who had revolutionized English-speaking theatre in the 1950’s and ’60s. He had brought Look Back In Anger, the play by another angry young man, John Osborne, to the screen as well as the same writer’s Tom Jones. Richardson had been a classically trained actor as well as a director. The writers, American Satirist Terry Southern and British Actor and Novelist Christopher Isherwood, provided him with a screenplay grounded in traditional tragedy, a theatre staple. While the story is a cascade of excess piled on excess their dialogue springs from character and always moves the story along.
The result is an exceptionally dark and exceptionally funny film which purposefully uses outrageous excess to target Hollywood insincerity, the funeral industry, the space program, motherhood, pet worship, Los Angeles weirdness and our national culture of excess. Thus Tony Richardson’s The Loved One is an archetypal 60’s flick.
My Favorite Moment In The Movie: While pursuing Miss Thanatogenis Dennis visit her home, a ramshackle death trap perched on a shaky hillside and poised to go crashing to the street far below at any second. Dennis cautiously enters with Aimee and finds the placed stuffed with gaudy, ornate bric-a-brac as Aimee’ explains, ‘ I love being surrounded by beautiful things’. She then steps out onto a deck which has no guardrail and begins swinging out over open space telling Dennis ‘ I love being close to death. It feels so free.’
My Favorite Dialogue In the Movie:
Aimee Thanatogenis, cosmetologist to the departed, upon seeing but not recognizing Dennis Barlow. ‘ I’m not good with live faces.’
Mr. Joyboy, chief Mortician at Whispering Glades when learning he has an infant to embalm. ‘ Well, off to baby.’
Mr. Joyboy’s obese mom on the kitchen floor reaching for a small dish after pulling a roast turkey along with the entire contents of the refrigerator on top of herself. ‘ Is that cranberry?’
Rev. Wilbur Glenworthy after discussing with his board the possibility of turning Whispering Glades into a senior retirement community where the turnover is more robust. ‘ I’ve got to find a way to get those stiffs off my property.’
Key Things To Look For While Watching The Movie: Haskell Wexler’s Cinematography. With a budget that precluded color his task was to bring life to the topic of death as depicted at Whispering Glades. He succeeded brilliantly. Due to his adept camera work the statues seem to come to life and his skillful use of shadowing brings depth and dimension to an otherwise static environment. Because acting is reacting actors will appreciate Wexler’s clever placement of mirrors and other reflective surfaces to catch the reaction of other actors, particularly Anjanette Comer in several scenes but most noticeably when Mr. Joyboy has brought Miss Thanatogenous home to meet mom.
Peerless casting. Beginning with the comic genius, Jonathan Winters, in dual roles and adding Sir John Gielgud and Broadway actor Robert Morse the director insisted on an unknown, Anjanette Comer, to play the hopelessly innocent Aimee Thanatogenis who eventually is devoured by the raging commercialism that is Whispering Glades. Along with these there is a hilarious sequence of cameos including Tab Hunter, James Coburn, Milton Berle and culminating with Liberace, not a performer known for his subtlety, as a deadly serious casket salesman.
Actors will appreciate the meticulous perfectionism Rod Steiger brought to the part of Lafayette “ Laff” Joyboy. Particularly affecting is Mr. Joyboy’s describing to Aimee’ his shopping for lobsters, his mother’s favorite dish, at the Food Giant on La Brea. This at first idle conversation becomes a cute little song-and-dance then a description of a dream and then a deeply moving monologue which more than hints at the dark well of Mr. Joyboy’s true feelings for his mom.
Robert Morse reported later that during filming Richardson liked to direct actors to pull pranks on other actors in their scenes. In one such instance he suggested to Morse that it ‘ might be fun’ if Anjanette Comer ended up in a pond during a lover’s chase scene at Whispering Glades. If you watch the film you will see that the actress just barely avoids being pulled into the pond by Morse.
The Casket Orgy Scene. No, really, watch the movie.
Amiee’ and Mr. Joyboy communicating back and forth by corpses on rolling dollies. Like I said, go watch The Loved One.
The Loved One is not a film which would shock today’s audiences. To appreciate the outrageousness it is necessary to set your cultural Way Back Machine fifty years. That was a time when wholesale disruption and confrontation of the status quo was erupting in every area. The Loved One endures as an iconic 60’s movie not because of the outrageousness which was groundbreaking at the time. In my opinion it endures as a classic tragedy. The casualties of the film’s targets, inhuman treachery for personal gain and voracious cultural excesses, are the genuinely decent Sir Francis Hinsely and the genuinely innocent Aimee’ Thanatogenous. That is why The Loved One is a Classic Film of the 60s.
Thanks, W. H.! To show our gratitude for your guest post, here’s a dash of creative juju for you. Whoosh!
We already have a set of classic 70s movies, 80s Movies and 90s Movies. This month, we’re working on 60s Movies.
For the original post explaining the series, go here.
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