Episode number two is upon us, this time it’s THE DENTIST OFFICE. Like all the episodes, this time the opening stage banter between Bud and Lou is Lou is forty the girl he’s dating is ten routine. You know, Bud’s four times older and in five years he’ll be three times older. At what point does she catch up? Delivered like only Bud and Lou can do it. We’ve seen the routine before, but the whole point of this Abbott and Costello Show is to catalog all these routines without all the other things that take up their features. So if you just want the comedy, here it is.
Once that classic routine is done, the biggest takeaway from this episode is that the Hillary Brooke character is finally established. I mean, it took to episode two! Very beautiful, very classy, cultured, and kind. I love the way she just starts speaking French to Bud and Bud says something to the effect that he can’t do that for her. Well, Lou, not understanding what she says, says he can. She kindly gets Lou an appointment at the dentist’s office she works at and during the hugging scene, Lou is too stupid to realizing she’s hinting at love! Love the relationship between her and Lou and her presence in season one.
We do get Sid Fields as a blind dentist trying to pull Lou’s tooth out. I especially like it when he goes after Lou’s ear. While it lacks the virtuosity of Shemp in the THE TOOTH WILL OUT, still an entertaining scene, even if better bits are to come. I do like Lou’s head going through the wall replacing the moose head and the casual banter between Bud and Hillary.
Lou’s tooth is still not out, so Bud comes up with some concoction of having Lou’s tooth tied and he gets dragged around as a cat is chasing a dog, hoping the tooth comes out in the process. It does lead to some real funny physical comedy with Lou getting tossed around every which way. Funny, but they’re still saving the best stuff for the end.
With a lot of Harold Lloyd reviews, I always mention his genius on milking a gag, like for example, trying to hide the fact he has no pants in AMONG THOSE PRESENT. Well now it’s Bud and Lou’s turn. Lou, tooth still not out, is given the idea from Bud if he goes to jail, the state will pay to have his tooth pulled. So Lou tries everything he can to go to jail and fails miserably. The failure all comes down to bad luck. You think he’s doing something illegal, but he either comes across as heroic or is just messing with the wrong person. Gag after gag of this, one after the other, all hysterical and I won’t give any of them away. I’ll just say it ends with some great car gags and poor Lou getting dragged around. Classic scene!
There’s another great bit, a three way verbal banter between Bud, Lou and Sid Fields. It involves Sid commenting on how the town knows Bud takes advantage of Lou’s imbecilic nature. As Bud tries to end it, Lou insists Sid continues going on about what an imbecile Lou is. Lou is too stupid to realize he’s being made fun of because the mere idea of Bud being yelled at overshadows any of that. Another fine verbal bit and Sid Fields can join Bud and Lou very well in this type of banter, as he’ll do in several episodes.
So yeah, another good episode and like I said, there aren’t really any bad ones. Just some better than others. As for Lou’s tooth? Great resolution at the end.