January 25

Dean Jones

I always liked Dean Jones. He appeared in numerous Disney films like The Love Bug series, Million Dollar Duck and my favorite The Ugly Dachshund. This is the one I watched. It also stared Suzanne Pleshette and Charles Ruggles. Suzanne is obsessed with her dachshund (they are like her children) and it has puppies. At the vet's there is a Great Dane that came from a too large litter and could not get enough milk so the dachshund wet nursed the puppy. The dachshund puppies cause all kinds of trouble. They eat birthday cake on the table, they wrap yarn all over the room and do damage in Dean's studio. The Great Dane tries to get the dachshunds to stop and ends up getting the blame for the problems and he does cause some damage just because he is so big. The scenes where the dogs destroy the studio and a party are great. The Great Dane is tied up in a shed and Dean gives him a bone. One of the Dachshunds takes the bone and the Great Dane follows the other dog to get his bone back. The chase destroys most of the party. Dean tries to find his place with all the females in the house. He plays the frustrated husband very well.

I wanted to watch another film besides the Disney ones, but there is little selection available. He is listed as being in Jailhouse Rock. When I saw the film for the first time last year I was so impressed with Elvis' performance that I didn't pay attention to the rest of the cast. I thought I had that on my DVR, but I could not find it. It was checked out at the library it was checked out and there only Disney films available. I found a DVD documentary on the cast recording of Company. He sang Being Alive. He has a great voice, but on the documentary he stated he doesn't think he can sing. I did not realize how great a cast it was in 1970.