And, as in the world of cartoons, Tashlin's live-action work is often devoted to characters with rubbery faces and plot lines that require significant suspension of disbelief. Tashlin, of course, is known for his bigger-than-life cartoon-like style (especially visible in films like The Girl Can't Help It, 1956 and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, 1957), a happy hangover from Tashlin's beginnings as a successful animator, working alongside luminary Tex Avery. Tashlin and Lewis made eight pictures together (beginning with Artists and Models, 1955) and it's still not known whether Dom DeLuise's performance in The Glass Bottom Boat (his second-ever film appearance) as a bumbling informant, was inspired by Lewis or not, even though it's very close to the type of wacky characters Lewis played in Tashlin's comedies. It is perhaps no wonder that the French, the first (the only?) ones on the planet to fully embrace Jerry Lewis would also be the premiere filmgoers to herald Frank Tashlin as a master of the absurd, while Americans remained, during his lifetime, largely unsure what to make of him. Meanwhile, Doris sings, Rod falls hard, and the Soviets ultimately miss the boat in this classic mid-sixties romp. They become certain that Day's mysterious calls to a certain Vladimir (her dog), and other misinterpreted behavior, are proof she's a secret agent. Taylor sets his sights on the dizzy but wholesome blond and the stage is set for mistaken identities galore, most of them set in motion by those protecting Taylor's top-secret project, known as Gismo. Day moonlights as a mermaid for her dad's Catalina glass bottom boat tour business and, as the film opens, is literally hooked by Taylor, little knowing that he's her new boss. Doris Day plays a widow who has just started a new job in public relations at a space laboratory that develops inventions by engineering wizard Rod Taylor. Brought to you by director Frank Tashlin, famous for his send-ups of '50s and '60s mass culture, who delivers spy thriller parodies, romance and even a few musical numbers in this screwball comedy, which includes a distinctly comedic supporting cast. Looking for a madcap romp complete with Cold War intrigue? Take a ride on The Glass Bottom Boat (1966) with Doris Day and Rod Taylor. The real culprits are apprehended, and Jenny ends up in her boss's arms. Jenny bolts out of a window and a mad chase follows. Unknown to her, a secret formula has been planted in her purse, and the real espionage agent pays her a visit when she arrives home. When she overhears Templeton discussing the possibility that she is a foreign spy, she makes misleading phone calls at a party at Templeton's home. Jenny's habit of "exercising" her dog Vladimir by telephoning him at home (he runs around the house whenever the phone rings), arouses the suspicions of CIA men. Templeton, delighted to discover that the woman he "fished out" of Catalina Bay is working at his plant, assigns her to write a definitive biography of him while he is test-piloting a new rocket. Jennifer Nelson, a young widow working in the public relations office of a space laboratory, meets her new boss Bruce Templeton when he accidentally catches his fishing line on a mermaid outfit she is wearing while entertaining tourists on her father's glass-bottom boat.
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