
The Geisha Boy. 1958. USA. Directed by Frank Tashlin. 98 min.
Screenplay by Tashlin, Rudy Makoul. With Jerry Lewis, Marie McDonald, Sessue Hayakawa, Suzanne Pleshette. As a bumbling magician on a USO tour of Japan, Lewis tangles with a preening movie star (Marie McDonald), befriends a kindhearted WAF sergeant (Suzanne Pleshette), and, as Lewis’s work takes a decisive turn toward pathos, develops a paternal relationship with a young war orphan. Resemblances to Chaplin’s The Kid are not coincidental, as Tashlin deliberately pushes Lewis’s emotional range.