User Reviews

When the story begins, you hear Mrs. McDoakes mention that they've been married five years...which is odd since Warner Brothers had been making these shorts for about a decade. Regardless, she wants Joe to fix the leak in the basement or have a plumber do it and unfortunately their idiot neighbor, Marvin, arrives to help. Naturally, neither one has a brain between them and Joe and Marvin nearly kill themselves trying to fix the leak.

This installment is fair but it does have some pretty amazing stunts...such as Joe swimming about underwater in the water-filled room. It must have been miserable making this short, though fortunately the results are worth it.

YET ANOTHER VARIATION on the home handyman school of situational comedies. Rather than what the title would suggest, neither Joe (George O'Hanlon) nor Marvin (Rodney Bell) actually take up the trade. Any and all applications of any wrenches, pliers and expanders are a result of needing to apply them in desperation, rather than in the exercise of craft.

WE ARE INDUCTED into the action at the beginning of the short, where the great inadequacy of the plumbing system in the household is put on display. The antiquated piping system won't adequately supply more than one water outlet at a time. The simultaneous application of Joe's attempting to take a shower being pitted against an industrious Alice doing the dishes in the kitchen sink becomes a sort of war of aqua attrition.

AT THIS POINT, Joe is joined by his neighbor and eccentric, Marvin whose enthusiasm is matched only by his ineptitude. It seems that in whatever the episode, Marvin's unrealized skills and childlike logic prove to be Joe's undoing.

PERHAPS THE CROWNING achievement and most unique contributions to the unique niche of the series in this short is the off beat pair of sight gags employed at the films conclusion. The first was that of having Joe attempting to speak to Alice over a waterlogged and completely submerged telephone. What we heard and saw was a desperate tirade of glub-glub-glubs amplified in visual and sound effects with a deluge of bubbles.

THE SECOND AND last of these bizarre gags is that of Joe's being sucked into the great drain by the heavy rush of water running down out of the aquatic hell that was once the Mc Doakes basement!

When Joe MacDoakes and his fat-headed neighbor try to fix the water heater, they flood the basement, which does them no good. It also gets the camera lens wet.

The Joe MacDoakes series combined situation comedy with some zany slapstick situations, and this one is no exception. Writer/Director/Producer Richard Bare delighted in little gags, like rats floating to safety on a miniature sailboat, that hearkened back to silent movies. After the series shut down in 1956,a victim of television, Bare would work in television himself, including the often surreal GREEN ACRES.

So You Want to Be a Plummer (1951)

*** (out of 4)

Once again Joe McDoakes plays cheap and decides to fix the plumbing in his house. With the help of Marvin they go at it but soon find themselves trapped in the basement with the water rising. This is another good entry in the series with George O'Hanlon and Rodney Bell doing great work together as McDoakes the the dumb neighbor Marvin. The more I see of the two men together the more I'm enjoying them as they have such different acting talents and comic styles that they just make an incredible on-screen couple. The highlight of the film actually happens before Marvin gets there and it's when Joe is trying to take a shower but the water keeps turning off and when it comes back on its extremely hot. Yes, a simple joke that we've seen in countless shorts but O'Hanlon really sells it and gives it a great laugh. The ending with McDoakes getting sucked down the drain has a wonderful pay-off.