Rhubarb and Rhubarb

I am going to preface this post on Rhubarb (1951) with a little personal info. When I was a child, I missed a lot of school, due to what was diagnosed as mononucleosis. I missed most of fifth grade, then most of seventh grade (since you don't get mono twice, I must have had some other disease, but never mind). It wasn't painful - I got some headaches, and was prone to colds, but I got to stay home in bed most of the time. I didn't get to play with friends, but I'm a bit solitary anyway. I got some tutoring and kept up with class from home (although I never learned long division). I read Tom Swift books, played with a litter of kittens, and watched a lot of daytime TV. I saw John Lennon on Dick Cavett! I also watched a lot of old movies on Dialing for Dollars. Now, I only remember a few: Bringing Up Father, Cheaper by the Dozen, and Rhubarb.

It starts with millionaire Gene Lockhart hanging around a golf course with two of his flunkies, Ray Milland and William Frawley. It seems there was a stray cat who liked to run up on the green and steal golfballs before the player can putt. Lockhart loves this - the courage, the fight in this cat. When the players set their dogs on the cat, they come running out again, scared. So Lockhart demands that Milland, who is his PR man, catch the cat for him. After several ruined nets and traps baited with golfballs, he succeeds.

To Lockhart's delight, the cat tears up his office, then settles down and learns to love him. Lockhart owns a failing Bronx baseball team, so most of Lockhart's cronies are retired ballplayers. One of them refers to the trouble the cat is causing as a rhubarb - "You know, a dust-up, a donnybrook". So that became the cat's name.

They are inseperable for years, with Rhubarb resting on a cashmere comforter beside him. And then Lockhart dies and leaves all his millions - including the team - to the cat. And Milland will run the business for him. While Lockhart's daughter argues with the lawyer, Frawley muses, "I dunno, some ballplayers might not like being owned by a cat. They're superstitious like that. I mean, they're human, too, in a way..." 

Turns out he's right, the players don't like it. Of course, they've been on a losing streak, so maybe things can't be worse. But Lockhart always said his team could win if they had the same will and fight that Rhubarb has, so Milland convinces them the cat is good luck. And it works.

Now, there's a bunch of stuff with Milland's girlfriend, Jan Sterling. She's allergic to the cat, and their marriage keeps getting postponed due to business. Then there's some gamblers and a catnapping, and a trial at the end. All in all, this movie is sort of cute, not really great. There aren't a lot of big laughs - it was based on an H. Allen Smith novel. The cat was mostly played by Orangey (seen in many other movies, including Comedy of Terrors), who is a big cat star, but you could see how much editing they had to do to make it seem like the cat was acting.

But, as a kid, I loved this movie, mostly because it was about a cat. And on this, my second watch, some 50 years later, I still loved it. It's silly, and just a little funny, and even less romantic. There isn't enough of the actual ballplayers either. But it did have Ray Milland and a bunch of great character actors. And Orangey.