When I was in high school, one of my favorite television shows was Wishbone,
a PBS show starring a Jack Russell Terrier who took the lead in each
episode’s 15-minute adaptation of a classic novel. Yes, this was a
series designed to encourage literacy in young children, like Reading Rainbow
but more plot-driven. But I didn’t care what the intended audience was.
I loved the clever way the series toggled between the ordinary,
everyday dramas of Wishbone and his family of humans, particularly young
teenager Joe and his friends, and the epic adventures found in stories
like The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Faust, perhaps priming me to readily accept the unusual structure of LOST
when I began watching it. Tightly paced and cleverly edited, these
episodes riveted me, and they introduced me to several books that I
would go on to read for myself.
The most memorable Wishbone introduction for me was Cyrano de Bergerac.
This story of a man with a large nose and an eloquent tongue fascinated
me, and when the book showed up as an option on my summer reading list a
couple years later, it made my decision as to which book to read easy.
I’ve seen several films and TV shows incorporating the concept of a
linguistically challenged man asking his buddy to furnish him with words
to help him court a woman, but usually it’s just a subplot. Last week, I
finally got around to seeing Roxanne, the Steve Martin
romantic comedy that is entirely based on this play, albeit loosely.
While I think I ultimately prefer the short but sweet Wishbone
treatment, the 1987 movie, which Martin wrote, is quite enjoyable.
Martin plays C. D., or Charlie, Bales, a small-town firefighting chief.
He’s a kind, witty man whose enormous nose is rarely a stumbling block,
but he begins to resent his facial structure when he meets Roxanne
(Daryl Hannah), a gorgeous astronomer only in town for the summer. These
two instantly connect on an intellectual level, but Charlie has pretty
much resigned himself to the single life, and whatever hopes he has
regarding Roxanne are dashed after she confesses her crush on Chris
(Rick Rossovich), a decent but dopey rookie firefighter. After
facilitating their first meeting, Charlie can’t simply step back and let
the relationship unfold naturally. If he isn’t able to have Roxanne for
himself, then he intends to live vicariously through Chris, who is such
a bumbler that he seems doomed to completely crash and burn without
Charlie’s help.
The bulk of the movie, then, involves Charlie
waxing poetic for Roxanne but attributing the words to Chris. In some
cases, he tells Chris what to say; in others, he spouts the words
himself under cover of night. Mostly, though, he sends letters. Lots and
lots of letters. Charlie is a brilliant writer whose florid prose makes
Roxanne swoon, but how long can he pull off this deception? And how
long will he want to?
While the first half of Cyrano de Bergerac
has a largely comical flavor to it, it turns tragic by the end. Martin
takes considerable liberties with the screenplay in that regard,
furnishing a much more Hollywood-style happy ending. Additionally, his
characters are not nearly as chaste as the ones written by Edmond
Rostand. There is plenty of innuendo in this movie, along with an
implied hook-up or two. The core relationships are pretty similar,
however. Chris is a handsome young simpleton, Charlie is his verbose
mentor, Roxanne is the lovely woman both men admire. While Chris is
pretty likable, it’s immediately apparent that Charlie is a better match
for the vibrant Roxanne.
While it’s fun to watch Charlie and
Chris try to woo Roxanne together without her catching on, the
hands-down best scene in the movie is the bar scene early on in which
Charlie, in an effort to humiliate a man who has dared to insult his
nose, rattles off 23 more creative ways in which he could have phrased
his slight. Martin gets to show off his rapid-fire wit here as his
clever jabs fly fast and furious. While most of the comedy in this movie
stems from verbosity, there is also some purely visual humor, most
notably a scene that finds Roxanne locked out of her house with no
clothes. Charlie, Chris and Roxanne drive all the action in the movie,
but small roles by Fred Willard, Shelly Duvall and John Kapelos add to
the humor.
Roxanne is a little bit raunchier than I
would have liked, but for the most part, it retains the core of
sweetness and celebration of intellectual prowess that is in the
original play - which, whether you come to it by way of Steve Martin or
Wishbone, truly is a classic.
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