Bugthug's post about the 1963 film "Endless Summer" got me thinking about another another GREAT movie from that year . . . it doesn't have many VWs, but there is one in the opening scene and guess who's riding in it . . . Buddy Hacket (who was Herbie's mechanic in "Herbie the Love Bug") and later in the movie Don Knotts (Herbie's mechanic from "Herbie Goes to Monte Carlo") makes a cameo apperance.  But it's not suprising since just about everyone who was working (or had worked and was still alive) in Hollywood had at least a cameo in it.

Name the film . . .  

One "Mad" short, but you got it!  It was on Comcast "On Demand" a while back.  I hadn't seen it 20 or 30 years and couldn't remember much about it other than I laughed all the way through it.  It's even funnier now.  And I never realized just how many folks showed their face in it.  

Main characters
Edie Adams as Monica Crump, wife of Melville Crump
Milton Berle as edible seaweed company owner J. Russell Finch
Sid Caesar as dentist Melville Crump (a role originally meant for Ernie Kovacs before his death in a car accident)
Buddy Hackett as comedy writer Benjy Benjamin
Ethel Merman as Mrs. Marcus, mother-in-law of J. Russell Finch and a very cranky woman
Dorothy Provine as Emeline Marcus-Finch, wife of J. Russell Finch
Mickey Rooney as comedy writer Dingy 'Ding' Bell
Dick Shawn as Sylvester Marcus, Mrs. Marcus' son and Emeline's brother
Phil Silvers as the out-of-work piano player Otto Meyer
Terry-Thomas as Lt. Col. J. Algernon Hawthorne
Spencer Tracy as Captain C. G. Culpeper
Jonathan Winters as truck driver Lennie Pike

Secondary characters
Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson as a cab driver
William Demarest as Santa Rosita's chief of police (Aloysius)
Jimmy Durante as Smiler Grogan (I think this was Jimmy Durante's last film appearance.  He died in the opening scene . . . after running off the road and being thrown from his car, he tells several bystanders about some stolen money he had hiden under a "Big W" then he literaly "Kicked the bucket" . . . and the "mad, mad, mad, mad" race for the cash starts.
Peter Falk as a cab driver
Paul Ford as Col. Wilberforce

There are too many cameos to name them all here, but they range from Buster Keaton to the Three Stooges to Jack Benny to Jerry Lewis . . . it would probably be easier to list who was alive in Hollywood in 1963 and WASN'T in the movie!  If you haven't ever seen it, or haven't seen it in years, you need to watch it.  

I could never get tired of that movie and I remember piling-up in our old Chevy wagon and watching it at the Marbro Drive-in. What a hoot! I've also recorded most of the old beach movies and Elvis movies, always in hopes of catching some cool cars with whitewall slicks and Radir 5 spokes...my wife says I've got issues. Buster Keaton was even in one of those beach movies. I've also got all the "car" episodes of The Munsters and Beverly Hillbilly's recorded. The 60's rule!

Fun time to be the "Terror" of Brainerd Rd. in my 1940 Merc. Vert.
     AH !   Nothing like tearing off the rear tires , listening to a screaming Flat head Ford V8 stroker TRYING to keep up with a small block Chevy.
     Wait a min !  I just had a senior "thing".  In 1963 I had a wife, baby Boy and a new VW Bug. What happen ?
     To bad that the young'uns of today missed out .  
     Love to watch the movies from that time and seeing the "New" Land Yachts and Schooners with to much sail cruising around the roads