1h 25min | Musical, Comedy | 12 August 1966 | Color, ws
Director: Arthur Lubin
Stars: Peter Noone, Shelley Fabares, Sue Ane Langdon, Herbert Anderson, Bernard Fox.
Wilda Taylor ... choreographer
Watched online, good print.
11 songs in Soundtracks, 1 without performers.
I know this director from a bunch of Abbott & Costello films. This is his penultimate; the last is released in '71.
I'm rather unpleasantly surprised that I recognized Peter Noone's name. I wasn't a fan of Herman's Hermits, and I was 12 when this film was released. I don't think of them as being popular very long, but there were around enough that they imprinted on my memory.
SF plays girl that PN pursues. SL is an actress pretending to know HH so that she can get publicity. HA is a state department functionary/victim (he gets a lot of liquids dumped on him), and BF is the HH manager.
The Gemini space rocket is named HH based on votes by astronauts' children. Don't remember why the state dept had to get involved. HA needs to learn more about HH, perhaps to get bio info for P.R. purposes? (I can picture the scene where they're discussing this, but not the rationale.) Events lead State to think they can name the rocket something else, but youth stage protests, and HH is reinstated as the name.
Then HH is required to be in Florida for the launch, but they have a concert in the Rose Bowl at the same time. So the Air Force uses their new hyperspeed plane that travels 3k miles per hour, and shuttles the boy back and forth during the concert. (I don't think the time zones make sense here. I think of launches as being early in the day and concerts being at night, or late afternoon at least. Both are shown as daylight events.)
Good news: only 1 more HH movie in '68. IMDb users agree with me: rated 4.6 with 230+ votes.
distr. MGM, dir. Lubin; 5-
