Ma and Pa Kettle
Ma and Pa Kettle are comic film characters of the successful film series of the same name, produced by Universal Studios, in the late 1940s and 1950s. They are a hillbilly couple with fifteen children whose lives are turned upside-down when they win a model-home-of-the-future in a slogan-writing contest. At the verge of getting their farm condemned, the Kettles move into the prize home that is different from their country lifestyle. After that, they are subjected to more unusual situations.
Originally based on real-life farming neighbors in Washington State, United States, Ma and Pa Kettle were created by Betty MacDonald in whose 1945 best-selling novel, The Egg and I, they appeared. The success of the novel spawned the 1947 film The Egg and I starring Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray, also co-starring Marjorie Main and Percy Kilbride as Ma and Pa Kettle. Main was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role
After the audiences’ positive reaction to the Kettles in the film, Universal Studios produced nine more films, with Marjorie Main reprising her role in all and Percy Kilbride reprising his in seven. The films grossed an estimated $35 million altogether at the box office[3] and are said to have saved Universal from bankruptcy.
Phoebe “Ma” Kettle (played by Marjorie Main) is a robust and raucous country woman with a potato sack figure. She is more ambitious and smarter than Pa, but not by much, and can easily be fooled. (In the book she is earthier and more profane. When she was a newly emigrated Baltic teenager she married Pa under the impression that, since he owned a farm, he was a solid prospect.) Ma is content with her role as mother to fifteen rambunctious, mischievous children on their ramshackle farm in rural Cape Flattery, Washington. Because she has so many children, Ma sometimes gets their names confused. A misspelled sign “Be-ware of childrun” is posted in front of the farmhouse to warn unwanted visitors of hurled rocks, projectiles from slingshots and pea shooters, and other missiles launched by the rowdy and unpredictable Kettle brood. Franklin “Pa” Kettle (played by Percy Kilbride) is a gentle, slow-speaking, slow-thinking and lazy man. His only talents appear to be avoiding work and winning contests.
In the first film of the series, Ma and Pa Kettle, the family moves into a modern home with numerous electronic gadgets that Pa has won in a tobacco slogan-writing contest. As the series continued, various reasons were devised to have the family relocate to the “old place”, sometimes for extended periods of time. Much of the comedy is cornball humor arising from preposterous situations, such as Pa being mistaken for a wealthy industrialist (“P.A. Kettle” in Ma and Pa Kettle at Waikiki, 1955)[4] or being jailed after he accidentally causes racehorses to eat feed laced with concrete (Ma and Pa Kettle at the Fair, 1952).
Recurring characters in the series
Thomas “Tom” Kettle is the eldest of the Kettle children and is portrayed by Richard Long in the first four films. Tom works hard and goes to college at Washington State University, studying Animal Husbandry. He designs an improved chicken incubator. He meets his future wife, Kim, in a train ride back to Cape Flattery, but due to work issues, the two relocate to New York City.
Kimberly “Kim” Kettle (née Parker) is the wife of Tom Kettle and is portrayed by Meg Randall in three films. She was the reporter for a popular Seattle magazine and came to Cape Flattery to write a series of articles on the Kettles and their new model home. Kim is very fond of the Kettles.
Birdie Hicks is the Kettles’ aging arch-nemesis and is portrayed by Esther Dale in four films. Birdie usually rides around in either her Model T car or her horse-drawn buggy with her elderly mother, lamenting Pa’s laziness and the family’s lack of organization. Apparently her mother, Mrs. Hicks or Mother Hicks sympathizes with the Kettles.
Billy Reed is the town’s efficacious salesman portrayed by Billy House in the first film (1947), and then by Emory Parnell in four films (1949–1954). Billy has a store in downtown Cape Flattery where his motto is written: “If there’s anything you need, just come in and see Billy Reed.” He often stops at the Kettle place to sell or to pay a visit to them.
Rosie Kettle is the Kettles’ second-eldest daughter portrayed by Gloria Moore in one and Lori Nelson in two films. She desires to go to Sheraton College, but is unable to do so because of the family’s economic instability. It is later learned that she works in Seattle. Rosie travels to Waikiki with Ma and Pa to help with cousin Rodney’s pineapple enterprise.
Jonathan and Elizabeth Parker are Kim Kettle’s parents portrayed by Ray Collins and Barbara Brown in two films. They travel from Boston to see Tom’s and Kim’s newborn baby in the fourth film. Elizabeth doesn’t get along with the Kettles at first, but over time realizes her mistake; Jonathan enjoys being with them from the start. The Parkers invite Ma and Pa to a trip to Paris in the sixth film.
Geoduck and Crowbar (Oliver Blake and Teddy Hart, respectively) are Pa’s Native American friends and usually act as his handymen, doing various tasks around the house under Pa’s “supervision.” Geoduck is the chief of their tribe.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia