Boeing Boeing (1965 film)

This article is about the 1965 film. For Other uses, see Boeing Boeing.

Boeing (707) Boeing (707) (alternately titled Boeing Boeing) is a 1965 American bedroom farce comedy film, based on the 1960 French play Boeing-Boeing, and starring Jerry Lewis and Tony Curtis. It was released on December 22, 1965, and was the last film Paramount Pictures made with Lewis, who had made films exclusively with the studio since My Friend Irma (1949).

Plot

Bernard Lawrence (Tony Curtis) is an American journalist stationed in Paris, France. A playboy, he has devised an ingenious system for juggling three different girlfriends: by dating stewardesses who are assigned to international routes on non-intersecting flight schedules, only one woman is in the country at any given time. He has their comings and goings timetabled with such precision that he can drop off his British United Airways girlfriend (Suzanna Leigh) for her outgoing flight and pick up his inbound Lufthansa girlfriend (Christiane Schmidtmer) on the very same trip to the airport—while his Air France girlfriend (Dany Saval) is in a holding pattern elsewhere.

With help from his long-suffering housekeeper Bertha (Thelma Ritter)—who swaps the appropriate photos and food in and out of the apartment to match the incoming girlfriend—none of the ladies is aware of each other's presence in the apartment. They regard Lawrence's flat as their "home" during their Paris layovers.

Bernard is so happy with his life in Paris that he intends to turn down an imminent promotion that would require him to move to New York City.

Bernard's life is turned upside down when his girlfriends' airlines begin putting new, state-of-the-art aircraft into service. These faster airplanes change all of the existing route schedules and allow the stewardesses to spend more time in Paris. Most alarming for Bernard, his three girlfriends will now all be in Paris at the same time.

Robert Reed (Jerry Lewis), a fellow journalist and an old acquaintance, complicates Bernard's life even further when he arrives in town and is unable to find a hotel room. He insists on staying in Bernard's apartment for a few days. When he sees Bernard's living situation, he schemes to take over Bernard's apartment, his girls, his housekeeper, and Bernard's Paris job while manipulating him into taking the new job in New York.

Production

Boeing Boeing was filmed from April 8 to June 30, 1965. As both Curtis and Lewis wanted top billing, their names appeared on a jet engine's rotating nacelle. The nacelle does not rotate, instead it is the first stage of compression/compressor/fan that is rotating.

Billing

Neither actor would relinquish top billing so the names at the beginning of the film spun around in a circle with an airplane nacelle behind them. For the trailer, the circular animation of the two names was repeated and neither name was spoken aloud. For the posters, the names made an X, Lewis' going up from the bottom left and Curtis' going down from the upper left.

Cast

• Tony Curtis ... Bernard Lawrence
• Jerry Lewis ... Robert Reed
• Dany Saval ... Jacqueline Grieux / Air France
• Christiane Schmidtmer ... Lise Bruner / Lufthansa
• Suzanna Leigh ... Vicky Hawkins / British United
• Thelma Ritter ... Bertha
• Lomax Study ... Pierre

Legacy

The film was selected by Quentin Tarantino for the first Quentin Tarantino Film Fest in Austin, Texas, 1996.

Home media

The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc on February 14, 2012.

See also

• List of American films of 1965
• Come Fly with Me, 1963 film
• Coffee, Tea or Me?, 1967 novel
• The Stewardesses, 1969 film

External links

• Boeing Boeing at IMDb
• Boeing Boeing at the TCM Movie Database