Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

 Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein

In 1948 the original big three classic Universal Monsters got their swan song with (in my opinion) the best of all of the monster rally films, Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.   This film would see famed comedic duo Abbott and Costello (famed for skits such as Who's On First?) meeting up with the Wolfman, Dracula, and Frankenstein's Monster, and one other classic monster plays a cameo at one point of the film.   Abbott and Costello are baggage handlers, who deliver two large crates to McDougal's House of Horrors (a horror themed wax museum), but the bodies of Dracula and Frankenstein's Monster are missing, and Abbott and Costello are on the hook for their disappearance.   Then a mysterious Larry Talbot arrives in search of the missing bodies, and a delicious mix of horror and comedy ensues.   Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein was directed by Charles Barton, with a screenplay by John Grant (who often writes for Abbott and Costello).   The film was distributed by Universal Pictures in 1948, and was a box office success making $3.2 million, against its $792,270 budget.

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein starred Bud Abbott as Chick Young, Lou Costello as Wilbur Grey, Lon Chaney Jr as Lawrence "Larry" Talbot/The Wolfman, Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula/Dr Lejos (this would be the only time that Lugosi would reprise his role as Dracula for Universal), Glenn Strange again plays Frankenstein's Monster (though at one point he was injured and Lon Chaney Jr filled in for him), Lenore Aubert as Dr Sandra Mornay, Jane Randolph as Joan Raymond, Frank Ferguson as Mr McDougal, Charles Bradstreet as Professor Stevens, and a very brief by the Invisible Man voiced by Vincent Price in an uncredited cameo.   What can I say about this cast, there are two of the greatest comedians of all-time, and three of the best Universal Monsters!   Lon Chaney Jr is the only actor in the original Universal Monsters cycle to play the Wolfman, Bela Lugosi the original and best Dracula returns for the first and only time, and Glenn Strange had in the past two films proven himself to be an excellent Frankenstein Monster.   The only thing really missing was Boris Karloff, though he was asked to appear, but he declined, he did however help to promote the film.   

Though this is a comedy film, the laughs are intentional, opposed to The House Of Frankenstein, where the film was meant to be serious and the poor execution of the film made it comical, that is not the case here.  In Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, you laugh because of the great comedic skills of Abbott and Costello, and intended gags, but the monsters themselves are giving heartfelt authentic performances, just as if they were making a serious film.   In Lon Chaney Jr's performance of Larry Talbot, you get the same sadness as you did in the original The Wolfman, he is still the cursed man, and he still causes the audience to feel sympathy for him.   With Bela Lugosi, it gives me chills, this is the first time since 1931 that Dracula has really been Dracula, anyone can play a vampire, but truly only Bela Lugosi can be Dracula, and he plays this role just as authentic as he did in 1931 in the first Universal Pictures "talkie" horror film, he created the sound of Dracula, and he brings that same sound, that same intensity, that mesmerizing sexiness to the character.   There are times when this film is a true horror film, with real characters, with the traits that made those characters lasting parts of our pop culture.   This film is so well done, and in my humble opinion one of the greatest films from the 1940's.

If you have not yet seen Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, I highly recommend checking it out!  This is a must see classic, whether you enjoy horror, comedy, classic film, or even just enjoy a genuinely great film, this is one that must not be missed, and has a place in every collectors collection. Abbott and Costello also have a film where they meet the Invisible Man, The Killer (with Boris Karloff), and the Mummy, all of these are great films, but this one final "monster rally" film is the best of them all.   I don't think that there was a monster mash film this great again until 1987 with the release of Monster Squad.   There is something about the comedic approach of this film, that works so well, something that just seems to be missing in more modern horror comedies, in the late 90's when the Scary Movie franchise was popular, it felt like they wanted to capture what Universal accomplished with Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, though where Abbott and Costello felt authentic, those films just felt cheap and trashy, the comedy was just bad and the horror was even worse.   Though Abbott and Costello Meet... (well all of their monster films really) play the classic horror tropes for laughs, it also feels like they are paying respect to those films, and they are making genuinely great films.