Just dug out my DVD copy of Walt Disney’s Seventies Teen Comedy THE COMPUTER WORE TENNIS SHOES the other day…MAN, how I love this movie!
You know, the first movie I ever saw at a Drive In Theater (the long-gone Waialae Drive In, for those keeping track) was THE STRONGEST MAN IN THE WORLD, a movie I was to later find out was the THIRD in a series starring a VERY young Kurt Russell, or the FIFTH in a series if you count Fred MacMurray’s two movies “Absent Minded Professor” and “Flubber”, as they all happened at the same college.
We kids of the Seventies were blessed with not only great live action Disney flicks like ESCAPE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN, FREAKY FRIDAY and all those HERBIE movies, but also a television program called “The Wonderful World Of Disney” on Sunday nights that would show older Disney flicks as well!
I religiously watched this show (and it still hold a dear place in my heart, as many of you may have guessed by the NAME of my blog!) and as it happened, a few months after I had seen “The Strongest Man In The World” at the Drive In, they aired “The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes” on television!
I was like ‘HEY! It’s that same kid from Strongest Man In The World…at the SAME College! And he’s involved in ANOTHER kooky experiment! COOL!”
The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes(1968) was the adventures of a student named Dexter Riley (Russell) who attended Medfield College, a kid who always seemed to be in the middle of some zany scientific experiment that would give him and his school fame and fortune. It was followed by “Now You See Him, Now You Don’t”(1972), and then the aforementioned “Strongest Man In The World”(1975). In each movie, Dexter is involved in some experiment that gives him out of the ordinary abilities like super-strength or invisibility- well, in this one, he gets electrocuted by the school computer and absorbs all the knowledge, becoming a walking memory bank!
Yes, the movies all had a similar theme, but something about Computer Wore Tennis Shoes always seemed to ring a little bit truer...It seemed to have more heart. There was actual attempt to flesh out his friends and teachers, and you always felt like his friends really loved him, and his teachers (especially Mr. Quigley, played by super TV Dad William Shallert) really had his best interests in mind. Throw in Joe Flynn as the insufferable Dean Higgins and the extremely over-the-top Cesar Romero (he of Joker fame) as the dastardly A.J. Arnau, and you had a top notch comedic cast of well-thought out characters, each who made the show even better in their own way!
There were a couple of scenes that come immediately to mind which really show that “heart” I mentioned in them:
After Dexter becomes the walking computer, he becomes a media sensation, and the fame attached to it find him beginning to ignore his colleagues, but when he is involved in a casino bust, his friends raise the money to bale him out, and a humbled Dexter realizes what true friends his pals are.
The College has sent Dexter to compete in a College knowledge/trivia debate, and since they need 4 students to enter, Dexter brings along his not-too-bright buddies to round out the team. But towards the ending of the debate, Dexter’s powers are starting to wear off, and he is having a difficult time answering. Finally, it is down to the last question, but Dexter just cannot get the answer out. His knowledge is gone! But his pal Schuyler pressures Dexter- “But Dex, You KNOW this one! Remember?” then they all realize that it doesn’t matter if Dexter knows it- SCHUYLER knows it! Schuyler answers the question and wins the tournament, a sweet victory for the kid who never had confidence in himself!
Of course, it wouldn’t be me it I didn’t mention the attractive young ladies in the movie as well, and there were a couple that really caught my eye- first up was Dexter’s infinitely patient girlfriend Annie, played by cutie Debbie Paine:
And the stoic leader of Medfield’s challengers the Springfiled Rockets, Ms. “J” Reedy (what did the J stand for? I’m betting it was Jane) played by pretty actress Hillyard Anderson:
Nothing much has been reported on either of these fine actresses after The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes…whatever happened to them? I’d be really interested in knowing what they’re up to nowadays!
