Here's a very unlikely and peculiar fright feature: an early 70's NBC-TV musical adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic Victorian-era novella with an unusually cast Kirk Douglas in the dual role of the good-hearted, blandly respectable Dr. Jekyll and his evil, lusty, gleefully immoral and animalistic id-run-amok alter ego Mr. Hyde. What's most surprising about this audaciously imaginative enterprise is how to a sizable degree it works extremely well. There's no denying that the schizophrenic titular part is any true actor's dream role; Douglas clearly knows this and gladly sinks his teeth into the part, playing the two wildly contrasting characters with lip-smacking brio. The rest of the cast is made up of top-drawer British thespians: Susan Hampshire radiates considerable charm as Jekyll's fiancé, Sir Michael Redgrave portrays Hampshire's prim'n'proper gentleman father to stuffy perfection, Donald Pleasence simply delights as a petty, scraggly street peddler, Susan George has a grand bawdy time as a fiercely proud and blithely naughty saloon showgirl, and Stanley Holloway displays an appropriate amount of concern as Jekyll's loyal, worried butler.
Sherman Yellen's script astutely captures the repressive mores and scientific curiosity which defined late 19th century London. The lavish costumes and fog-shrouded sets vividly evoke the period. The score by Lionel Bart, Mel Mandell and Norman Sachs is rather hit-or-miss, supplying a decidedly mixed bag of tunes which range from mediocre and forgettable to lively and enjoyable. The better songs are good, jaunty fun, distinguished by especially catchy and witty lyrics. The cast belt out the songs with terrifically infectious aplomb; it's a real treat to see Douglas, Pleasence and the underrated George cheerfully rip into their numbers. Alas, there are a few glaring flaws which gum things up to a fair extent: pedestrian, workmanlike direction by David Winters (who later helmed the laughably bad Joe Spinell psycho vehicle "The Last Horror Film"), flat cinematography, and a blurry, rough-on-the-eyes shot-on-video look that results in an ugly and unappealing visual texture. These faults asides, this picture still holds up as an admirably fresh and novel take on an often-told hoary old chestnut creepy tale.
Sherman Yellen's script astutely captures the repressive mores and scientific curiosity which defined late 19th century London. The lavish costumes and fog-shrouded sets vividly evoke the period. The score by Lionel Bart, Mel Mandell and Norman Sachs is rather hit-or-miss, supplying a decidedly mixed bag of tunes which range from mediocre and forgettable to lively and enjoyable. The better songs are good, jaunty fun, distinguished by especially catchy and witty lyrics. The cast belt out the songs with terrifically infectious aplomb; it's a real treat to see Douglas, Pleasence and the underrated George cheerfully rip into their numbers. Alas, there are a few glaring flaws which gum things up to a fair extent: pedestrian, workmanlike direction by David Winters (who later helmed the laughably bad Joe Spinell psycho vehicle "The Last Horror Film"), flat cinematography, and a blurry, rough-on-the-eyes shot-on-video look that results in an ugly and unappealing visual texture. These faults asides, this picture still holds up as an admirably fresh and novel take on an often-told hoary old chestnut creepy tale.