Who Done It?, starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello
review of Abbott and Costello's Who Done It? a radio murder mystery, co-starring Mary Wilkes and William Bendix, with their classic "Watts-Volts" routine
Editorial review of Abbot and Costello’s Who Done It?, courtesy of Amazon.com
In this slapstick comedy thriller, Bud Abbott and Lou Costello play would-be radio writers who find themselves involved in a real murder during the recording of a “whodunit” play. Trying to solve the crime, they are suspected by the police-and targeted by the killer! A madcap chase through the radio station features a riotous encounter with a fitful drinking fountain, a mix-up in a sound recordings library, and a runaway elevator. With a strong supporting cast including Mary Wilkes as a wisecracking secretary and William Bendix as a cop who’s even dumber than Lou, Who Done It? has been called “one of Abbott and Costello’s best,” by critic Leonard Maltin.
I rate it 4 clowns 
on a 5-clown scale.
Funny movie quotes from Who Done It? starring Abbott and Costello
Mervin Q. Milgrim (Lou Costello): [nauseous] I gotta go back upstairs and get something…
Chick Larkin (Bud Abbott): What have you gotta get?
Mervin Q. Milgrim (Lou Costello): My stomach…
Col. J.R. Andrews: Mr. Turner, may I remind you that I have a contact for your services, and I intend to exercise it.
Jimmy Turner: You’ll get plenty of exercise trying to find me.
Mervin Q. Milgrim (Lou Costello): Operator! Give me Alexander two two, two two!
Telephone operator: The line is busy!
Trivia for Who Done It? starring Abbott and Costello
- This was the first Bud Abbott and ‘Lou Costello’ film that did not contain musical numbers. As a result, it was shortest film that they had made to date.
- The ”watts-volts” routine was not in the script. It was created by Bud Abbott and ‘Lou Costello’ on the set.
- As part of a display on telephones and communication, the Smithsonian Institute used a clip of ‘Lou Costello’ trying to call in for the radio contest to demonstrate the mechanics of placing a call with an operator-run exchange.
- During the scene in which Costello is “interrogating” the radio show cast, he blurts out the question, “Where were you on ‘The Night of January 16th’”? This is an obscure, throw away reference to the famous Broadway play of the same name by Ayn Rand, the Russian born novelist and philosopher who wrote “The Fountainhead” and “Atlas Shrugged”. “The Night of January 16th” was also made into a movie in 1941.
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