Say One for Me

Tacky Twentieth Century-Fox comedy-drama with music (and an eleventh-hour holiday theme) has Robert Wagner miscast as the wolfish manager of a risqué nightclub. He's having trouble conquering new showgirl Debbie Reynolds, a church-going college kid trying to earn enough dough to pay for her father's operation. Bing Crosby plays the local priest who tracks Debbie down ("She said she was working as a secretary!" ... "Find the typewriter!"), only to steal a joke from the floor-show to help out a local comedian. Wan mixture of spiritual uplift and boy-chases-girl nonsense doesn't quite jell, at least not with old-school comedy vet Frank Tashlin at the helm. Tashlin's pacing is lively enough, and he works well with Reynolds, but the combination of prayer with salty backstage personalities trips him up. The picture never finds an appropriate tone, and Crosby--trading his famous Father O'Malley role from "Going My Way" for the lookalike Father Conroy--phones his performance in. ** from ****