This is one of my All-Time favorite movies, even though it is more than 50 years old. If there are any fans out there, who is your favorite character from The Egg and I and why do you like them? Also interested in other discussion about this film from anyone interested.
shareI love Pa Kettle. (Percy Kilbride should have been nominated at the Oscars for every film he did in the series.) He is lazy and humorous but without being aware of it(well being humorus anyway). Does anyone else think that these films should have had an Oscar nod here and there?
shareThe Kettles really stole the picture. Percy Kilbride was peerless.
I love the scene where Ma explains that she used to try to keep things tidy but it was just easier to join the rest of the family. And who can resist that young and adorable Richard Long. MacMurray and Colbert were a delight. He so single-minded in pursuit of his chicken farm, and she so out of place.
In Betty McDonald's novel Pa always blames the *beeps* in Washington for anything that goes wrong in his life. It's a philosophy I use to this day (only my *beeps* are in Ottawa).
You can lead a horse to water, but a pencil must be lead.
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Ma Kettle! she's a riot.Yes comedy gets overlooked at Oscar time.
shareI agree. Marjorie Main was a scene stealer in virtually all of her movies. And she steals them here. Most enjoyable.
shareI adore Ma Kettle and have all my life. I am a slight bit older than the film. But there are so many other rich characters in the picture, like Birdie Hicks, whose mother looks like she's maybe three months older than she is. She's such a preachy, bitchy goody-two-shoes. You can't help but enjoy her. I love when she tells off Betty at the dance: "We don't stand for rough-house at these shindigs." Then there's Harriet Putnam, the competitive lady farmer who wears 1947 Vogue fashions and has milking machines to do her work. Why she's after thick-headed Fred MacMurray when the oldest Kettle boy is so much more good-looking and smart is anyone's guess. Maybe she just likes stealing her neighbor's man.
Hollywood is Hollywood. What else can I say?
BTW, I loved Margerie Maine. (sp?) in the movie. That couldn't have anyone better. I still want see a lot of her movies, which just don't seem to get shown on the idiot box these days. Cheers, R.
Harriet Putnam competition neighbor played part slickly. Yet gotta go for CC.
The Welcome dance party where she ends up with nearly every type of guy down to
the short one barely up to her neck. Can't see him until she turns around.
She just has so much grit and bounce. Just about everything goes wrong but
she hangs in there.
I spent a few years up state NY in Pleasant Valley, next to Millbrook, on a
real family run chicken farm. It was run mainly by the wife who had 2 large
coops and did it natural way. People would drive around from all over for her
eggs, fresh chickens, deer meat, etc. Kept some cows, a bull, geese, young
harness racing horses. Quite the fun right down to running off a fox.
Only downer was the climate. It was right on snow line. Out in country you
could actually feel the temp drop by 10 degrees as drove into the area. Right
near Taconic Parkway, most wicked, deathtrap, 'highway' ever built by Depression era makeworkers. Thing is banked wrong direction so curves send
you right into a ditch when wet or icy.
Never had neighbors do any pitch in salvation like in Egg. But they did leave
you alone which was all you could ask for when trying to paint. Being just hour from NYC made it more of an extended suburb, yet still was country.
Sweet movie. "All the best men are taken." "Not long at all." Good lines by
the neighbor.
I loved the weird guys at the dance. I started noticing the unusual number of basket case guys even before they started dancing with Betty. Each dance partner was more grotesque than the last. A laff riot! Those guys made Pee Wee Herman & Carrot Top seem normal. In fact I think one of 'em WAS Carrot Top!
I just saw this movie for the first time the other day, and while it was fun, it also was sort of annoyingly stupid and had some rather large continuity errors. But, I loved the Kettles and I also loved the woman who was 'an invalid.' She cracked me up!!
shareBanjo
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Ma Kettle of course. Especially in the ending when she civilizes The city couple who have hired a city nurse who is so anti-bacterial and anti-germ that Ma cannot stand her especially after having raised 15 of her own kids.
shareMa Kettle.
I just bought the 4 movie collection: Volume 1 from Walmart for $13.
Ma Kettle kind of reminds me of my late mother. The scene where she just clears the table by sweeping everything off reminds me of my mother when she would lose her temper because the table wasn't cleaned off yet.
I just watched this movie last night after not seeing in about 10 years and I loved it all over again.
I loved Claudette Colbert but I'd have to say Marjorie Main would be my favorite. She just cracks me up. When she was setting the table and just flung off whatever was in her way, I laughed so hard.
Great, great movie!
Marjorie certainly stole the movie and hers was one of the very few performances in a comedy at that time to be nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award. I really love the female cast in this film - Claudette, Marjorie, bitchy hag Esther Dale, sweet little old imp Ida Moore. And a special acknowledgement to the wonderful Richard Long who is like the ultimate "nice young man" in movies.
shareMarjorie Maine stole th film.
Her character was kind, dithery, and occasionally wistful.
I love it when she tells Henry to move over and finds out the boy is not Henry...."whatever your name is, move over".....
"a malcontent who knows how to spell"
Yea, she is a hoot, alright!!
I was always curious about why she (Ma) would scratch herself every time she mentions Pa in that scene when Betty shows up at their house the first time and she's helping Ma set the table.
It's almost like she's breaking out in hives at the very mention of his name!!
Any suggestions?
"Go back to your oar, Forty One."
Margorie Main as Ma Kettle. A close second is Mrs. Hicks, because I always like Esther Dale. My least favorite is Percy Kilbride as Pa Kettle. Kettle is a shiftless, no-account weasel. Ma deserved a better husband.
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