Bob Hope and Bing Crosby were unlike most other comedy teams in that each person was already well known outside of the team before teaming together. They would also continue to do work outside of the team in the years they were together, at times taking years in between films. Bob Hope had been making comedies for a few years at Paramount and Bing Crosby was also a successful film star and more importantly, a recording artist. ROAD TO MOROCCO is the third film they made together, all with the “road” theme, ROAD TO SINGAPORE and ROAD TO ZANZIBAR being the previous two. For a couple of famous guys who did not need each other to have a successful career, they both work wonderfully well together and ROAD TO MOROCCO is perhaps their most loved film out of all the Road movies.
Hope and Crosby tend to have a buddy theme together yet never to the point where they won’t double cross each other. In ROAD TO MOROCCO, there’s plenty of double crossing to be had. In the beginning of the film, they are stranded on a raft out to sea and Crosby contemplates resorting to cannibalism and eating Hope! He also sells Hope into slavery and Hope has no trouble giving his girl, Dorothy Lamour, away to Bing when he finds out whoever marries her first will be dead within a week. With all the double crossing, the deceased Aunt Lucy in ghost form, played by Bob Hope in drag, comes to scold Bob and Bing for the way the treat each other to hilarious results.
Speaking of Dorothy Lamour, she is a fixture herself in these Road movies, always stirring competition between Bob and Bing with Bing always getting her in the end. Lamour, one of the classic Hollywood beauties, worked very well with the two comedians and the chemistry these three had together is somewhat reminiscent of Wheeler and Woolsey with Dorothy Lee. Both Dorothys can sing and usually have musical romantic numbers with one of the comedians, even if obviously Bing Crosby musically is on a higher level than Bert Wheeler. Wheeler and Woolsey generally did not compete for their Dorothy the way Bing and Bob did, but it must be said, in this particular Road film, Bob does get a pretty girl of his own after the initial competition fades, played by Dona Drake. Since Woolsey did usually get a girl as well, this again brings a Wheeler and Woolsey comparison.
While there are musical numbers in ROAD TO MOROCCO, it is a bit ironic that they don’t seem to take up quite as much of the film as some of the Abbott and Costello movies. If they do, it just doesn’t feel that way. While most of you know I’d rather see Slayer bust into “Angel of Death” in the middle of one of these things, Bing is not a bad guy at all to be doing these musical numbers and frankly, the audiences of the time expected it since he was a major recording artist. Like Wheeler and Woolsey, I also like it better when one of the comedians does the music versus an outside young lover. It personalizes the comedy team much more into the story. There is a fun introductory musical number with Bing and Bob, a straight romantic number with Bing and Dorothy and a comic musical number with all three in the desert randomly singing in each other’s voices in lip synch mode. All excellent stuff.
The comedy is very well written. There are lots of fourth wall breaking lines. Examples include mentions of the censors and their Paramount contract in the opening song, a camel, lips moving in cartoon form, mentioning how this is the screwiest movie he’s ever been in, and best of all, Bob recapping the movie in a jail cell, Bing mentioning he knows all this and Bob saying he’s mentioning it for the benefit of those who walked into the middle of the picture. Not really a gag heavy film, we still get a bit where Bing and Bob pretend they are bobbing mechanical heads blending in with the others in the room to hide from the enemy and there’s a lot of glorious low slapstick in the tent finale that always bring a smile to my face. Tons of quick funny lines sprinkled throughout delivered in a way only Bob Hope can do. Other than a not average looking nose, Hope never had a great comic look, but when it comes to delivering a comic facial expression or line, few were better than Bob Hope. His performance in ROAD TO MOROCCO was no exception.
One other self referential gag worth mentioning is when Bing and Bob start to do “paddy cake” and the villain, played by Anthony Quinn, smacks them around before they can finish. In previous Road films, they’d finish paddy cake and sock the villain, but it’s determined this villain has seen the previous Road films and knows the routine.
So yeah, great piece of classic Hollywood overall. Wonderfully designed, well written, well performed and man did Bob Hope live forever. Died at the ripe old age of 100 and outlived his comic peers by decades - in 2003. So yeah, give your respects to Bob, Bing and Dorothy and watch ROAD TO MOROCCO, you’ll have a good time. Oh, and if “sickdrjoe” is out there and ever reads this review, thanks for taping this one for me all those years ago.
