Norman Panama Filmography

Born:: April 21, 1914 in Chicago, IL
Occupation:: Director, Producer, Screenwriter
Biography:: While attending the University of Chicago in the early 1930s, Norman Panama collaborated on a play with his classmate Melvin Frank. It was the beginning of a partnership that would span nearly thirty years. Panama and Frank went on to write sketches for the 1939 Shubert revue Keep Off the Grass...Read More

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Barnaby and Me

Crew: Director

Actors: Juliet Mills

Synopsis: Norman Panama's penultimate directorial effort, Barnaby and Me was originally filmed for Australian television. The title character is a talented Koala Bear, who is to Australian fans what Benji is to Americans. Pausing in his escape from a vengeful mobster, American con artist Caesar falls in Read More

1977
I Will, I Will for Now

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Elliott Gould, Diane Keaton, Paul Sorvino, Victoria Principal, Robert Alda

Synopsis: Norman Panama directed and wrote (along with Albert E. Lewin) this mediocre piece of fluff about unhappily divorced marriage partners. Elliot Gould stars as Les Bingham, who takes umbrage that his ex-wife Katie (Diane Keaton) has a new love in life. What Les doesn't realize is that her new Read More

1976
Coffee, Tea or Me?

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Karen Valentine, John Davidson, Michael Anderson, Jr., Louise Lasser, Lou Jacobi

Synopsis: A dirty joke that became a "clean" TV movie, Coffee, Tea or Me stars Karen Valentine, cast to type as a perky stewardess. In a chaste variation of The Captain's Paradise, Valentine finds herself married to two different men in two different countries. Since the men are played by John Davidson and Michael Anderson Jr Read More

1973
The Maltese Bippy

Crew: Director

Actors: Dan Rowan, Dick Martin, Carol Lynley, Julie Newmar, Mildred Natwick

Synopsis: Cashing in on the popularity of their comedy series Laugh-In, comedians Dan Rowan and Dick Martin team up ala Abbott and Costello in this spoof of old horror movies and mysteries. Rowan plays a pornographic film producer and Martin plays his star, who is having trouble sleeping at night and Read More

1969
How to Commit a Marriage

Crew: Director

Actors: Bob Hope, Jackie Gleason, Jane Wyman, Maureen Arthur, Leslie Nielsen

Synopsis: Frank Benson (Bob Hope) and his wife, Elaine (Jane Wyman), decide to end their marriage after 20 years. Their daughter, Nancy (Joanna Cameron), announces she wishes to marry her college sweetheart, David Poe (Tim Matheson). David's father, Oliver (Jackie Gleason), is against the union and tries to Read More

1969
Not with My Wife, You Don't!

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Tony Curtis, Virna Lisi, George C. Scott, Carroll O'Connor, Richard Eastham

Synopsis: In the words of Hamlet, there's a plentiful lack of wit in Not with My Wife, You Don't! Korean war vet Tony Curtis is living in London, blissfully married (so he thinks) to Virna Lisi. In strolls old air force buddy George C. Scott, who has a history of stealing Curtis' ladies away from him. Read More

1966
Strange Bedfellows

Crew: Producer

Actors: Rock Hudson, Gina Lollobrigida, Gig Young, Edward Judd, Terry-Thomas

Synopsis: This romantic comedy stars Rock Hudson as Carter Harrison, an executive rising through the ranks of a major oil company. When he meets Toni Vincente (Gina Lollobrigida), a beautiful but hot-tempered artist, it's love at first sight and they quickly marry. The bloom is soon off the rose, however Read More

1965
The Road to Hong Kong

Crew: Director, Screenwriter

Actors: Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Joan Collins, Dorothy Lamour, Robert Morley, Walter Gotell

Synopsis: This was the last trip in the "road" comedies that Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, and a bevy of female stars that featured Dorothy Lamour once made famous. In this road to Hong Kong and parts far beyond, Chester and Harry (Hope and Crosby) are a couple of failed vaudeville stars looking for a way to Read More

1962
The Facts of Life

Crew: Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Bob Hope, Lucille Ball, Ruth Hussey, Don DeFore, Louis Nye

Synopsis: Unlike the typical Bob Hope and Lucille Ball vehicles, The Facts of Life is essentially a domestic drama with comic undertones. Hope is married to Ruth Hussey, while Ball is the wife of Don DeFore. All four are old friends, who for many years have taken each other for granted. A series of Read More

1960
The Trap

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Richard Widmark, Lee J. Cobb, Tina Louise, Earl Holliman, Carl Benton Reid

Synopsis: This is a routine, sometimes unintentionally funny drama about a man whose moral backbone straightens up as he sets his sights on capturing a gangster -- his own boss. Richard Widmark is Ralph Anderson, the petty criminal who returns to his hometown with his mob boss Victor Massonetti (Lee J. Read More

1959
The Jayhawkers

Crew: Producer

Actors: Jeff Chandler, Fess Parker, Nicole Maurey, Henry Silva, Herbert Rudley

Synopsis: Set in the Kansas territory during the middle of the 19th century, this is a visually evocative but conventional western. The story deals with Darcy (Jeff Chandler), a ruthless man, one of the raiders known as "Jayhawkers" who wants more than what life is willing to offer. Starting out as Read More

1959
Li'l Abner

Crew: Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Peter Palmer, Leslie Parrish, Stubby Kaye, Howard St. John, Julie Newmar

Synopsis: 1959's Li'l Abner was adapted from the hit 1956 Broadway musical--which, in turn, was inspired by the satirical comic strip by Al Capp. Peter Palmer recreates his Broadway role as Li'l Abner Yokum, the handsome, muscle-bound, muscle-brained leading hillbilly of Dogpatch, USA. The citizens of Read More

1959
The Court Jester

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Danny Kaye, Glynis Johns, Basil Rathbone, Angela Lansbury, Cecil Parker

Synopsis: Danny Kaye spoofs medieval swashbucklers in this classic musical comedy. While the infant King of England awaits his rightful place as leader of the British Empire, his rule is usurped by Roderick (Cecil Parker), an evil pretender to the throne. Brave rebel leader The Black Fox (Edward Ashley) Read More

1956
That Certain Feeling

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Bob Hope, Eva Marie Saint, George Sanders, Pearl Bailey, David Lewis

Synopsis: For reasons unknown, the change-of-pace Bob Hope vehicle That Certain Feeling is out of favor with many Hope buffs. Bob plays Francis X. Dignan, the overly neurotic "ghost" for popular comic-strip artist Larry Larkin (George Sanders). When Larkin's syndicate complains that his work isn't as Read More

1956
White Christmas

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, Vera-Ellen, Dean Jagger

Synopsis: White Christmas, Paramount's belated follow-up to the 1942 hit Holiday Inn, was the studio's first VistaVision production. A veritable warehouse full of oldie-but-goodie Irving Berlin tunes are woven into the film's simplistic plotline, along with a handful of new songs, of which "What Can You Do Read More

1954
Knock on Wood

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Danny Kaye, Mai Zetterling, Torin Thatcher, David Burns, Leon Askin

Synopsis: With the exception of the brilliant The Court Jester, Knock on Wood must rank as the best of Danny Kaye's movie vehicles. Capitalizing on the star's recent successful engagement in London, the film casts Kaye as a neurotic American ventriloquist performing in England and Europe. In a parody of the Read More

1954
Above and Beyond

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Robert Taylor, Eleanor Parker, James Whitmore, Larry Keating, Larry Gates

Synopsis: Above and Beyond is the story of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, as told from the perspective of the man who flew the mission. Robert Taylor stars as Col. Paul Tibbetts, commander of the Enola Gay. Once selected for this extremely dangerous mission, Tibbetts must hand-pick a crew worthy of the Read More

1952
Strictly Dishonorable

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Ezio Pinza, Janet Leigh, Millard Mitchell, Gale Robbins, Maria Palmer

Synopsis: Strictly Dishonorable is a musicalized version of Preston Sturges' cynical Broadway comedy of the same title, previously filmed sans songs in 1931. Ezio Pinza, fresh from his stage triumph in South Pacific, stars as Augustino Caraffa, an opera star whose amorous adventures are legend. Janet Leigh Read More

1951
Callaway Went Thataway

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Fred MacMurray, Dorothy McGuire, Howard Keel, Jesse White, Fay Roope

Synopsis: Callaway Went Thataway is an amiable spoof of early television's "Hopalong Cassidy" craze. Fred MacMurray and Dorothy McGuire star as Mike Frye and Deborah Patterson, advertising copywriters who have pulled off quite a coup by purchasing the old "Smokey Calloway" Westerns for TV. Trouble begins Read More

1951
The Reformer and the Redhead

Crew: Director, Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: June Allyson, Dick Powell, David Wayne, Cecil Kellaway, Ray Collins

Synopsis: MGM's The Reformer and the Redhead was the first directorial collaboration of longtime screenwriting partners Norman Panama and Melvin Frank. The reformer is Andrew Rockton Hale (Dick Powell), a mayoral candidate. Hale butts heads with a corrupt political machine, which has recently ordered the Read More

1950
The Return of October

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Glenn Ford, Terry Moore, Albert Sharpe, Dame May Whitty, Henry O'Neill

Synopsis: In this whimsical fantasy, a young girl suddenly discovers that her horse is really a reincarnation of her beloved uncle who upon his death bed was heard to say that if could ever come back, he would want to be a race horse that wins the Kentucky Derby. When the girl's relatives learn of her Read More

1948
A Southern Yankee

Crew: Screen Story

Actors: Red Skelton, Brian Donlevy, Arlene Dahl, George Coulouris, Lloyd Gough

Synopsis: Hot on the heels of Columbia's The Fuller Brush Man, MGM released another Red Skelton gagfest, A Southern Yankee. Set during the Civil War, the film casts Skelton as bumbling bellboy Aubrey Filmore. Yearning to help the Northern cause by becoming an undercover spy, Aubrey succeeds beyond his Read More

1948
Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House

Crew: Producer, Screenwriter

Actors: Cary Grant, Myrna Loy, Louise Beavers, Melvyn Douglas, Reginald Denny, Jason Robards, Sr., Lex Barker

Synopsis: Fed up with crowded big-city living, advertising executive Mr. Blandings (Cary Grant) decides to seek out a big, roomy house in the country. Armed with more enthusiasm than common sense, Blandings causes many a headache for his lawyer/business manager Melvyn Douglas, who tries to keep the costs Read More

1948
It Had to Be You

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Ginger Rogers, Cornel Wilde, Percy Waram, Spring Byington, Ron Randell

Synopsis: A precursor of sorts to the 1999 Julia Roberts vehicle The Runaway Bride, It Had to Be You stars Ginger Rogers as Victoria Stafford, a wealthy girl who has been engaged three times, and has three times chickened out at the altar just before saying "I do." Determined to wed her fourth fiancé Read More

1947
Road to Utopia

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Dorothy Lamour, Robert Benchley, Hillary Brooke, Douglas Dumbrille

Synopsis: The first "Road" picture in three years (the last was The Road to Morocco), Road to Utopia is set during the Alaskan gold rush. Bob Hope and Bing Crosby play a pair of third-rate San Francisco entertainers, Chester Hooton and Duke Johnson, who are obliged to skip town in a hurry. They book passage Read More

1946
Our Hearts Were Growing Up

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Gail Russell, Diana Lynn, Brian Donlevy, James Brown, Bill Edwards

Synopsis: Our Hearts Were Growing Up is the sequel to Paramount's surprise 1944 hit Our Hearts Were Young and Gay. The first film was based on the memoirs of actress Cornelia Otis Skinner; the sequel was inspired by the fevered imaginations of the screenwriters. Gail Russell plays Ms. Skinner, while Diana Lynn Read More

1946
Monsieur Beaucaire

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Bob Hope, Joan Caulfield, Patric Knowles, Marjorie Reynolds, Cecil Kellaway

Synopsis: Monsieur Beaucaire, Booth Tarkington's novel about an 18th-century French barber who poses as a swashbuckling aristocrat, was the surprising source for this Grade-A Bob Hope comedy. While in the original novel the tonsorial hero pretended to be someone he wasn't by choice, in this 1946 film Hope Read More

1946
Duffy's Tavern

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Bing Crosby, Betty Hutton, Paulette Goddard, Alan Ladd, Dorothy Lamour

Synopsis: Several of Paramount Pictures brightest stars make cameo appearances in this comedy set in "Duffy's Tavern," a favorite watering hole from old time radio shows. The trouble begins when the neighborhood bar is in danger of closing. The trouble begins when the proprietor, Archie, discovers that one Read More

1945
And the Angels Sing

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Dorothy Lamour, Fred MacMurray, Betty Hutton, Diana Lynn, Mimi Chandler

Synopsis: An unofficial remake of the 1935 Alice Faye-George Raft vehicle Every Night at Eight, And the Angels Sing stars Dorothy Lamour as Nancy Angel, unofficial leader of a struggling, Andrews-like singing sister act. Nancy is in love with saxophone player Happy Morgan (Fred MacMurray), self-appointed Read More

1944
Thank Your Lucky Stars

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Eddie Cantor, Dinah Shore, Bette Davis, Joan Leslie, Dennis Morgan, Humphrey Bogart, Olivia de Havilland, Edward Everett Horton

Synopsis: Practically everybody on the Warner Bros. lot shows up in the wartime morale-boosting musical extravaganza Thank Your Lucky Stars. Believe it or not, this one has a wisp of a plot. A pair of enterprising producers, played by S.Z. Sakall and Edward Everett Horton, want to hire singer Dinah Shore Read More

1943
My Favorite Blonde

Crew: Screen Story

Actors: Bob Hope, Madeleine Carroll, Gale Sondergaard, George Zucco, Victor Varconi, Lionel Royce

Synopsis: Each of Bob Hope's "My Favorite" films (My Favorite Blonde, My Favorite Brunette, My Favorite Spy) was, by accident or design, a parody of a dead-serious movie genre. 1942's My Favorite Blonde, for example, was a takeoff of Alfred Hitchcock in general and Hitchcock's 39 Steps in particular. Read More

1942
Happy Go Lucky

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Mary Martin, Dick Powell, Eddie Bracken, Betty Hutton, Rudy Vallee

Synopsis: In this lighthearted musical comedy, Marjory Stuart (Mary Martin) is a girl who works in the hatcheck room at a Manhattan nightclub and dreams of being a rich socialite herself. Toward that end, Marjory wants to land a rich husband, so she saves up her money and takes a cruise to the Caribbean Read More

1942
Star Spangled Rhythm

Crew: Screenwriter

Actors: Victor Moore, Betty Hutton, Eddie Bracken, Anne Revere, Walter Abel

Synopsis: Star-Spangled Rhythm is a typical wartime all-star musical-comedy melange, this time from Paramount Pictures. The slender plot involves the efforts by humble studio doorman Pop Webster (Victor Moore) to pass himself off as a big-shot Paramount executive for the benefit of his sailor son Jimmy (Eddie Bracken Read More

1942