Las Vegas Hillbillys

Year releasted: 1966

by Keith Phipps
January 29th, 2003

What would happen if a family of hillbillies unexpectedly came into money and moved to Beverly Hills? The answer to that question can be found elsewhere, but a related question—what would happen if a family of hillbillies unexpectedly inherited a low-rent Las Vegas bar staffed by Mamie Van Doren?—is answered in Las Vegas Hillbillys, a 1966 vehicle for country star Ferlin Husky. Husky stars as a happy-go-lucky backwoods type with half-suppressed dreams of becoming a country star. Resigned to singing while driving a beat-up old truck and wistfully recalling a Vegas-based uncle who once returned to their mutual hometown in Tennessee with a companion who was "as pretty as a peacock's tail flying over a petunia patch at sunset," Husky consigns his aspiration to the local talent show, the site of the first of the film's many musical sequences. After watching Bill Anderson and Connie Smith perform, Husky takes the stage in a none-too-country beige windbreaker, but receives a tepid reception. Only a day later, however, he's off to see the big-city lights of Las Vegas with best friend Don Bowman at his side. But to get there, they have to drive. That process is captured in exhaustive detail: They drive through a tunnel, then along a mountain road, then up a snowy hill, then through another tunnel, then, finally, across a dam, where they encounter a stranded Jayne Mansfield, later revealed as "the biggest star in Las Vegas." After helping her with a bit of car trouble, they reach Husky's inheritance, where a musical sequence featuring a writhing Van Doren is already in progress. Husky soon learns that there's more to Vegas than aging '50s bombshells; along with the Old West-themed saloon and Van Doren's contract, he's inherited a remarkable amount of debt. What could solve the problem? How about some musical numbers? "You can't turn this place into a hillbilly music hall," Van Doren protests. "They'll laugh you out of Las Vegas." But a roving biker gang certainly doesn't laugh when the house band plays a jazz version of "Dixie," provoking an impromptu round of go-go dancing. As for bigger musical events, Husky can only dream about them—which he does, in a dream sequence featuring himself, an unflatteringly shot Wilma Burgess, Sonny James, Mansfield, and, in a grand finale, Sonny James again. But dreams don't keep bill collector and future Bond villain Richard Kiel away. Nor does an all-star performance featuring songs from Roy Drusky, Del Reeves, and (that's right) Ferlin Husky. What does keep Kiel away? A film-concluding pie fight, of course.