Fancy Pants
Brief Synopsis
Cast & Crew
George Marshall
Bob Hope
Lucille Ball
Bruce Cabot
Jack Kirkwood
Lea Penman
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
In 1905, on a cricket field outside London, George Van Basingwell, a British gentleman, meets Mrs. Effie Floud, of the American nouveaux riches , and her daughter Agatha, who is beautiful but has coarse manners. George invites the Flouds to a borrowed country estate, because he has none, and hires a troupe of actors to pose as his aristocratic family. George's butler, "Humphrey," is played by American actor Arthur Tyler, who is broke and stranded in London. After repeatedly spilling trays of beverages on his co-star, who is impersonating George's mother, Lady Brinstead, "Humphrey" is fired. Effie then enthusiastically hires him for her estate in Big Squaw, New Mexico, hoping his cultured British demeanor will reform her down-to-earth husband. Mr. Floud misunderstands Effie's note informing him of Humphrey's arrival and tells the townsfolk that an earl is visiting. Humphrey agrees to pose as the earl, while dodging the efforts of Aggie's tough fiancé, Cart Belknap, to kill him for stealing his bride. President Theodore Roosevelt decides to pay Big Squaw a visit in order to meet the earl, and the town hopes that a good impression will win New Mexico a vote for statehood. Arthur, terrified, leaves town, but Aggie goes after him, and after he confesses his real identity, she convinces him to impersonate the earl for the president. The president and the earl get along famously until Arthur agrees to lead a fox hunt, even though he cannot even ride a horse. Aggie teaches him to ride and confesses her love. The next day, while the fox is being rubbed with gravy to entice the "hounds"--a motley mob of local house pets--Arthur feigns a hurt leg to avoid riding a wild horse. Cart smears Arthur's clothes with gravy, and after a chase with the dogs through the house, Cart finds Arthur's acting scrapbook and threatens to expose him. When Roosevelt comes to say good-bye to his good friend the earl, Cart exposes him. Aggie and Arthur are run out of town while driving a handcar on the railroad tracks. Just after Arthur assures Aggie that nothing could pull them apart, a train collides with them in a tunnel and the handcar is cut in half.
Director
George Marshall
Cast
Bob Hope
Lucille Ball
Bruce Cabot
Jack Kirkwood
Lea Penman
Hugh French
Eric Blore
Joseph Vitale
John Alexander
Norma Varden
Virginia Keiley
Colin Keith-johnston
Joe Wong
Robin Hughes
Percy Helton
Hope Sansberry
Grace Gillern
Oliver Blake
Nora Bush
Chester Conklin
Jim Drum
Maxine Willis
Edgar Dearing
Alva Marie Lacy
Ida Moore
Ethel Wales
Jean Ruth
Jimmie Dundee
Bob Kortman
Major Sam Harris
Gilchrist Stuart
Olaf Hytten
Alex Frazer
Howard Petrie
Ray Bennett
Harry Martin
Almira Sessions
Ethyl May Halls
Mira Mckinney
Gilbert Alonzo
David Alvarado
Robert Dominguez
Vincent Garcia
Henry Mirelez
Alfred Nunez
Jac Lucas Fisher
Marie Bryant
Howard Mitchell
Charley Cooley
John Mallon
John W. Grant
Lorna Jordan
Cathy Dart
Connie Montoya
Crew
Claire Behnke
Guy Bennett
Charles Berner
Richard Breen
Monte Brice
Malcolm Bulloch
Polly Burson
Frank Butler
Julie Cockerill
Herbert Coleman
Sam Comer
Roger Creed
Ed Crowder
Francis Cugat
Billy Daniels
Barney Dean
C. Kenneth Deland
Mary Kay Dodson
Hans Dreier
Pat Drew
Phil Eastman
Farciot Edouart
Irving Elinson
Richard English
Ray Evans
Richard Flournoy
Robert Goodstein
Curtis Gourlay
Frances Grant
John Hamilton
J. Haring
C. Harper
Edmund Hartmann
Earl Hedrick
Len Hendry
Gordon Jennings
Don Johnson
C. L. Jones
W. W. Jones
Wallace Kelley
C. Klein
Emile Kuri
Charles B. Lang Jr.
Jay Livingston
Ronnie Lubin
Archie Marshek
Kenneth Meade
Gene Merritt
J. Miller
John "skins" Miller
Mickey Moore
Robert O'brien
G. Palmer
S. Patrick
Webster Phillips
Joseph Portillo
Ray Rennahan
James Rosenberger
Oscar Rudolph
B. Sheets
Karl Silvera
Gile Steele
Dwight Thompson
Van Cleave
Jim Van Horn
Lenore Weaver
Robert L. Welch
Wally Westmore
Sid Zipser
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
You act if gravy was on it!- Agatha
Trivia
In a scene involving Lucille Ball and Bob Hope on a mechanical horse, Hope took a tumble off the horse and suffered a mild concussion.
Notes
The working titles for the film were Ruggles of Red Gap and Where Men Are Men. Harry Leon Wilson's novel was adapted for the stage by Harrison Rhodes (New York, 25 December 1915). The opening credits read: "Starring Mr. Robert Hope (Formerly Bob) and Miss Lucille Ball." According to information in the Paramount Collection at the AMPAS Library, Paramount began production on this film in 1947, with Mel Epstein slated as producer, Edmund Hartmann working on the screenplay, and Betty Hutton as the star. The tentative titles were Lady from Lariat Loop and Lariat Loop. News items report that Hutton declined the role, and that the studio attempted to borrow Jane Russell from Howard Hughes to co-star with Hope, but the deal fell through. The production was canceled, and was rekindled in 1949.
Additional information in the Paramount Collection reveals that the production was delayed by a series of script changes, and by Bob Hope's back injury, which occurred on the set on August 1, 1949. Production was "temporarily" closed on August 13, 1949 due to the injury. Some scenes were shot on location in Santa Fe, NM, and at Busch Gardens and Chatsworth in Los Angeles, CA. Actor John Alexander, who plays "Teddy Roosevelt" in this film, also portrayed a character who believed he was Theodore Roosevelt in Warner Bros.' 1943 film Arsenic and Old Lace, directed by Frank Capra, and the 1941 stage play of the same by Joseph Kesselring.
Other films based on Ruggles of Red Gap, all of which were released under that title, include a 1918 Essanay film, directed by Lawrence C. Windom and starring Taylor Holmes; a 1923 Famous Players-Lasky film, directed by James Cruze and starring Edward Everett Horton; and a 1935 Paramount production, directed by Leo McCarey and starring Charles Laughton (see AFI Catalog of Feature Films, 1911-20; F1.3804; 1921-30; F2.4730; and 1931-40; F3.3847). As several reviews state, Fancy Pants was very different from the 1935 film, with many additional comic bits geared towards Hope and Lucille Ball.
Miscellaneous Notes
Released in United States Fall September 1950
Released in United States on Video September 10, 1990
Released in United States Fall September 1950
Released in United States on Video September 10, 1990
