Detroit Muscle

I remember going to see Doctor Detroit (1983) at a bar or maybe Chinese restaurant in some small NH/VT city after a long hike, or maybe just because chances for entertainment were few and this bar or restaurant showed movies! But I don't think the timeline works, because our days of hanging out in the Great North Woods were pretty much over by 1983. So where did I see it?

No matter. When the Projection Booth podcast did their take on it, I was intrigued enough to go back to it. Would we get the good or sucky Dan Akroyd?

Akroyd plays Cliff Skridlow, a nerdy Chicago professor. We meet him out for a power walk - a limo full of escorts and their pimp gives him a hard time in passing. The pimp, Smooth Walker (Howard Hesseman) turns out to be in trouble with Mom (Kate Murtagh), the town's crime boss. He comes up with a scheme to blame it all on this uber-tough guy, Dr. Detroit. When he runs into Akroyd again in an Indian restaurant, he has his scapegoat.

The plan is to befriend Akroyd, ply him with booze, women, pot, women, cash, women, then turn the girls over to him and get out of Dodge. And this Hesseman proceeds to do. This is my favorite part - the corruption of the innocent. Like the bar scene in Mad Wednesday, when Harold Lloyd takes his first drink and comes out of his cocoon. He is a nerd, and he stays a nerd even when plied with booze and marijuana, but he gets very goofy and lets his romantic side show. He is, after all, a professor of heroic literature.

Plus, there's the girls:

• Blonde Donna Dixon
• Asian Lydia Lee
• Black Lynn Litfield
• Jewish Fran Drescher

Yes, Drescher is sexy Jewish-American Princess. I don't know why that tickles me so much, but it does.

When Hesseman takes off for Pago Pago, leaving Akroyd to look after the girls, he steps up to the plate. A quick trip to the theater dept costume room, and he is Doctor Detroit, complete with fright wig and metal hand. And we're off to the races.

The last act has Akroyd attending two parties at once: a gala being held by his father, George Furth, the president of Akroyd's college, and the Players Ball, where the Doctor is being made Pimp of the Year. Of course, this situation is a farce classic, and it's played very well.

I had remembered this as second-class Akroyd, and I still feel that way. But after this watch, I'd put it at the top of the second class. It's not often sidesplittingly funny, but it holds together. In some ways, it's like an old Danny Kaye comedy, updated, if that's your thing.