Hanky Panky

This week, we lost one of the greats, and one of my favorites to watch, Gene Wilder. Wilder was a comedy genius. Nobody could do mild to manic the way he did. Probably best known for playing Willy Wonka, the films he did with Mel Brooks, or his collaborations with Richard Pryor that made them one of the greatest comedy duo's of all time. Wilder's name has been linked to a lot of comedy classics. This week I thought I would look back at some of his forgotten gems that deserve another look. First up is 1982's Hanky Panky.

Wilder reteamed with his Stir Crazy director, Sidney Poiter to make this Hitchcockian style comedy that's similar in tone to Wilder's earlier film Silver Streak. After falsely accused of murdering a woman he just met, Kathleen Quinlan, architect Michael Jordan, Wilder...and yes, that is really the characters name, finds himself on the run from the police and the actual murderers as he tries to clear his name. On his trek he meets up with Kate, Gilda Radner, who is in search of her brothers' murderer. The two team up to seek out the killers.

Not quite as much fun as Silver Streak, but there's still plenty of laughs. Both Wilder and Radner have great chemistry together, which makes sense since they hit it off off screen as well and eventually were married. Oddly enough, this was meant to be another Wilder/Pryor teaming, but when Pryor couldn't do it, they rewrote his part for a female and brought on Radner. She and Wilder would go on to make two other films together.

Hanky Panky isn't a totally memorable film, but it's a great little time killer.

It's available on dvd.