22: Fat Man In Charge
Joel & Ethan Coen are exceptional comic writers. Even their non-strictly comedy films are filled with funny moments and lines. The pinnacle of their humor however came early. The funniest line the Coens ever gave us is not “Would that it were so simple” from Hail, Caesar! (2016), it is not “We have… your shit” from Burn After Reading (2008), it is not “We thought you was a toad” from O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), it is not “You’re not wrong, Walter, you’re just an asshole” from The Big Lebowski (1998), or “[he was] just funny lookin, more than most people even!” from Fargo (1996), or any of the myriad hilarious lines from the subject of this very essay series.
The funniest single line the Coens ever wrote is from Raising Arizona (1987):
“Do these balloons blow up into funny shapes at all?”
“Well no....unless round is funny.”
It’s the stupidest joke possible, but it’s that majestic rarity of a joke that gets funnier the more you hear it. “No” would have sufficed, but just in case “what if this guy just thinks regular round balloons are funny? Better cover my bases.” How could “round” be funny? “Round” is hardly even a shape, it’s more a category of shapes. Anything that isn’t rectilinear is round. There’s another layer though: the line only gets funnier when you realize that round is funny. Fatness has been a comic signifier from Laurel Hardy down through Homer Simpson, and Joel & Ethan Coen love playing on this trope as well as that of using roundness as a symbol for a kind of potentially undeserved but nonetheless very real authority as is evident in the way one might use the term “fat cat”, and no one exemplifies this like the titular character of The Hudsucker Proxy.
Charles Durning plays Waring Hudsucker, the titular Hudsucker of The Hudsucker Proxy. He only appears in two scenes, one in which he jumps out of a window near the beginning of the film and one in which he’s an angel come to deliver a divine message near the end. He has little screen time but at the same time his character looms over the entire film. Hudsucker Industries (whatever it is and what they do) was built by him. Everything the characters do is motivated by his creation. Sidney Mussburger wishes to control it, Amy Archer wants to understand it, and poor Norville Barnes has been put in charge of it with the expectation of crashing it to the ground. In every way his presence should command respect, and he does, kinda, but he’s also funny because he’s round, and round is funny.
Durning had a long career of many notable parts, including two roles that won him supporting actor Oscar nominations in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982) as the governor of Texas and To Be or Not to Be (1983) as the Nazi Col. Erhardt. All of these roles can be traced through the lens of perhaps the defining role of his career though: Sgt Moretti in the Sidney Lumet classic Dog Day Afternoon (1975). Moretti is the hostage negotiator who must deal with the desperate bank robber Sonny Wortzik as played by Al Pacino. He arrives on the scene in his ill fitting suit desperate to control the situation. He as the police officer in charge of the bank-robbery-gone-wrong is the representative of order attempting to reimpose itself on a chaotic situation, but he is not a powerful commanding force, he is the poor bureaucrat stuck with the thankless gig of restoring order. More than anything he’s tired. He’s willing to do the hard work to get the city back to normal, but boy is it ever exhausting.
His further work plays on these themes of being a voice of authority, but often with a bit of ridicule to him. In The Muppet Movie (1979) he plays Doc Hopper, a powerful restaurateur attempting to intimidate the talented but unknown Kermit The Frog into becoming a spokesperson for his fried frog’s legs restaurant. He has power and privilege that Kermit does not, but that power comes from, y’know, a frog’s legs restaurant. As the governor of Texas in Whorehouse he’s unquestionably the voice of authority as he is literally the governor, but that very authority is undermined by the fact that he lacks a clear moral compass informing his decision whether or not to shutter The Chicken Ranch, basing the decision on polling rather than conviction. As Erhardt he’s the head Nazi in charge of the 3rd Reich’s presence in Warsaw, but regardless of what supposed talent and intellect got him to the position of Colonel, it’s not enough to not be duped by Bronski’s hammy acting.
As Waring Hudsucker, he commands the respect and admiration of his boardroom, as he never speaks a word and yet holds the board members captive as he winds his watch, climbs on a table, stretches*, and runs across the massive table and out the window. Later, he is literally a voice of the divine as he comes down from paradise to deliver a message to Norville and save his life. Hudsucker commands authority over everything happening in Hudsucker, even though it’s mostly from beyond the grave. As Norville speaks to Hudsucker it’s clear that on some level he still thinks of him as his boss. Unlike as the Governor of Texas, Doc Hopper or Col. Erhardt, there’s nothing silly about the nature of Waring Hudsucker’s authority. Nonetheless though, there’s something silly about Waring Hudsucker himself, and I have a suspicion as to what exactly makes it so.
He’s round, and round is funny.
The Coens love putting round loud men in positions of power. Their power is in no way not real because of their roundness, but it does project a kind of silliness about them. Studio boss Jack Lipnick from Barton Fink (1991) is a blowhard to be sure, but a powerful blowhard, inspiring fear and deference from Barton and underling Lou Breeze, but he’s still funny.
The previously discussed Jon Polito as Johnny Caspar in Miller’s Crossing (1990) is terribly insecure, but he commands enough power to end the lives of many of his enemies, but there’s something funny about his insecure anger.
David Huddleston as Jeffrey “The Big” Lebowski in The Big Lebowski (1998) whose wealth and power ultimately turns out to be a sham still adequately projects the idea of a loud and powerful business tycoon for the majority of the film’s runtime, but he’s still somewhat buffoonish.
Menelaus Lee “Pappy” O’Daniel in O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), also played by Durning is oafish and out of touch, but is nonetheless a powerful figure in the film’s fictitious Mississippi.
Even JK Simmons as the CIA Officer untangling the mess of Burn After Reading (2008) projects the same kind of exhausted authority Durning did as Moretti in Dog Day Afternoon, but with a more comic air, and while Simmons is of average build, his most prominent feature is his hairless perfectly round head.
All these men project a kind of real and unquestionable authority but they’re also kind of ludicrous because they’re round, and round is funny. Even a counterexample becomes the exception that proves the rule. Josh Brolin’s character the studio executive Eddie Mannix in Hail, Caesar! (2016) is flinty eyed, square jawed, and has a kind of ruggedly handsome build. He is also the only unfunny character in the movie. The movie itself is hilarious, but only because of the dozens of absurd situations exploding around the studio as Mannix is all business, dealing with ridiculous actors, directors, gossip columnists, and clergy with deadly seriousness.
The Hudsucker Proxy is a supremely silly movie. It is full of sight gags and pratfalls and stupid jokes. It is so silly that it’s incredibly easy to forget that its framing device is a man jumping off a skyscraper to his death and his successor nearly doing the same. Yet even this dead man himself does not alter the film’s silly tone. His scenes are still funny, they’re not even “dark comedy” funny, they’re just regular old garden variety silly. Charles Durning has majestic comic chops, pulling a white Monte Cristo cigar from his angelic robes and pointing at his halo saying “How do you like that thing? They’re all wearing them upstairs. It’s a fad.” Even still, his presence exudes a kind of silly physicality. “Don’t worry” his presence says “I may jump out a window, but this is still silly” as the circular structure of the film both begins and ends with his presence. That circular structure after all suggests roundness, and round, after all, is funny.
*Durning’s first job after getting out of the Army after World War II (itself a notable achievement, did you know that Durning was the only man in his unit who survived storming the beaches at Normandy?) was as a professional ballroom dancer. When he climbed on the table he wished to have as graceful a run and jump as possible, so he went back to his old dancing stretches to shake any tension out of his legs before the run. The Coens liked the way it looked, so they kept it in the film.