THE PINK PANTHER RETURNS ... TO HOLLYWOOD

Just a little story about coming full circle.

Over 30 years ago in June '75, Dad and I were together in Los Angeles, and he insisted on taking me to see the original "Return of the Pink Panther" with Peter Sellers at its exclusive first run at the Cinerama Dome Theatre, a Hollywood landmark. He dragged me along kicking and (almost) screaming. But I was quickly won over by the absolutely daft genius of Peter Sellers as Inspecteur Clouseau de la Sûreté Nationale. I was planning to be a French major at Wheaton later that fall, so what was not to like?! I remember laughing so hard it was painful.

" 'ave you a lisahnce for your minkey?" he asks the blind man on the street corner. And then there was the scene where the parrot gets swallowed by the vacuum cleaner manned by Clouseau posing as house keeping.

When I moved to Hollywood-Los Feliz back last August, I happened to drive past the old theatre on Sunset Blvd. (yes, THE Sunset Blvd.) and instantly recognized it as the theatre he had taken me to back in '75. (How many theaters are shaped like a huge dome?) And a plan was hatched in my head to see a movie there sometime "for old times' sake." I did actually get to that theater several times in later months, in fact. It's now part of a huge mall/parking complex called "Arclight Cineplex" and has over 20 separate theatres, along with shops, restaurants, and a cooking school. They've kept the original "Dome" theatre for their special film débuts. But each time I went, it seemed, the Dome had some movie I had no interest in seeing or was sold out (most recently "King Kong"), so I'd end up in one of the smaller, newer theatres instead.

Then, a remake of the Pink Panther movies came out just this month starring Steve Martin. I wondered whether by some odd chance it, too, might be débuting at the Cinerama Dome. I checked the paper today and ... sure enough, "The Pink Panther" was playing at the Dome! How propitiious, I thought. The same film series at the same theater as the one Dad and I went to 30 years ago!

I just got back from seeing it now, and ... well, Steve Martin deserves a lot of credit for a valiant attempt to fill the original shoes of Peter Sellers. In fact, he looks more French at times. The humor is usually predictable long before a gag, but it's still a fun ride. And there seems to be more of Paris, real Paris, in this particular film - which is never a thing to be sneezed at. So, overall B+.

And thanks, Dad, for sharing your love of goofy, no-redeeming-social-value humor many years back. We went to all the later Pink Panther films religiously.