Don't Drink the Water

The Hollander family just wants to have an enjoyable European holiday. What they get instead is a hijacked plane to Vulgaria and mistaken identities as spies, forcing them to take refuge in the American Embassy until they can be rescued. If this sounds like the mad-cap, screwball scenario of a film from the sixties, it's because...it is. The 1969 film comedy, Don't Drink the Water, was based on Woody Allen's play written in 1966. At the time, Allen was kicking around London, waiting to shoot a small part in Casino Royale (1967), a spoof of the Bond films that Allen helped script. The delay turned into six months, and Allen used the time to his advantage by writing Don't Drink the Water. The play enjoyed a one year run on Broadway. When 20th Century Fox was organizing a film version, however, Allen was conspicuously absent. Shot mostly in Quebec and Miami, Don't Drink the Water was "inspired by Woody's firsthand impressions of what it was like to be in a foreign country, deprived of the everyday necessities of New York life, while the plot, said Woody, posited the idea of what might happen if his own family were let loose abroad, even though they had never had that experience." (from Woody: Movies From Manhattan by Julian Fox). Starring Jackie Gleason and Estelle Parsons, Don't Drink the Water was helmed by Howard Morris, a man of many talents. Beginning his career entertaining WWII troops with Carl Reiner, he cut his teeth working for Sid Caesar during the 50s. Reflecting on his relationship with Morris, Reiner once commented, "The thing about Howie that's most interesting is the extent of his talent." Beginning in the 60s, his voice was used for hundreds of Hanna-Barbera characters in animated cartoons and he delivered many memorable performances on the big and small screen, most notably in Mel Brooks' High Anxiety (1977) and as Ernest T. Bass on The Andy Griffith Show (1960-8). Behind the camera he teamed up with the screenwriters of Don't Drink the Water, R.S. Allen (no relation to Woody) and Harvey Bullock to make the light comedies Who's Minding the Mint? (1967) with Milton Berle and With Six You Get Eggroll (1968) starring Doris Day. Jackie Gleason, already a comedy legend for his work in The Honeymooners (1955-6) and his enormously popular variety show The Jackie Gleason Show (1952-9), brings his larger-than-life presence to the screen as father Walter Hollander. As his hapless wife Marion, Estelle Parsons gets a shot at a comedic turn, a change of pace for an actor nominated for her supporting work in the dramas Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Rachel, Rachel (1968). Don't Drink the Water's supporting cast has some notable additions: Ted Bessell, as the ambassador's son, was best known as "That Guy" Don Hollinger from the That Girl (1966-71) television series starring Marlo Thomas. Michael Constantine has received recent notice as the Windex-wielding father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002). And Richard Libertini, who reprised his role from the Broadway show to the screen in his first major film credit, is best known for his offbeat, quirky characters, like the cosmic mystic from Carl Reiner's All of Me (1984). Director Morris takes another turn in front of the camera and pops up in an uncredited role as the aged getaway pilot who's been on call for six years. Even Unit Manager Martin Danzig gets in on the action in a bit part! All fun and games aside, Woody was not amused. The film's editor, Ralph Rosenblum, recalled (in Woody: Movies From Manhattan by Julian Fox) 'He [Howard Morris] didn't do a very good job of it. He missed the whole point of the thing. It should have been in these very cramped little quarters of this foreign embassy and he blew it up, made it much too lavish. It finally cost about $8m but no one came to see it. It was a terrible failure.' Woody's dissatisfaction with the film version of Don't Drink the Water led him to direct and star in his own television version in 1994, co-starring Michael J. Fox. Producer: Jack Grossberg, Charles H. Joffe, Joseph E. Levine, Henry Polonsky, Jack RollinsDirector: Howard MorrisScreenplay: Woody Allen, R.S. Allen, Harvey BullockCinematography: Harvey GenkinsFilm Editing: Ralph RosenblumArt Direction: Robert GundlachMusic: Patrick WilliamsCast: Jackie Gleason (Walter Hollander), Estelle Parsons (Marion Hollander), Ted Bessell (Axel Magee), Joan Delaney (Susan Hollander), Michael Constantine (Krojack), Howard St. John (Ambassador Magee). C-100m. Letterboxed. by Eleanor Quin