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pg9-emperors-duds1

“The people care not one whit for the inner workings of government. They only care that I look the part. If I’m to appear as a slovenly, disheveled ragamuffin, the subjects would assume that I am as common and ordinary as they are and unfit to rule this vast kingdom. No, they want to look up to me. They need to admire me. They demand I oppress them! And I shall.”
– The Emperor’s raison d’etre that proves to be his undoing

Now we go from one fashion-centric fairytale about maintaining royal appearances to another. The Emperor’s New Clothes is the story that best encapsulates the lesson “clothes (don’t) make the man”. Though popularized by Hans Christian Andersen, the original version goes as far back as 1300s Spain. It’s one of many cautionary tales collected by Prince Juan Manuel of Villena in his moralistic compendium Libro de los ejemplos. Leaning into the fact that these stories were not intended for children, the king in this narrative is tricked into buying a suit that’s “invisible” to any man who’s not the son of his presumed father. A similar story is told in India, where the ruse is exposed when the commoners ask their king if he’s become a naked monk.

Andersen was unfamiliar with the Spanish original but based his take on a German translation. The alterations he made reflected his ire towards the vanity, pride, and false intellectualism of the upper class. One such change, however, reflects an incident in Andersen’s own life. As a boy, his parents took him to see the king’s procession through town; so much hype was built up around him that upon seeing the monarch for himself, young Andersen declared “But he’s only a man!” Despite his family shushing him, he would not be silenced. There’s little doubt that this scene influenced the climax of his story.

Hollis Robbins, in her critique of The Emperor’s New Clothes, states that the tale is so transparent that there’s no need for scrutiny. If you’ll forgive the expression, it wears its moral on its sleeve. And yes, I can see where Robbins is coming from, but that doesn’t make it any less important. In the wake of certain administrations and the ongoing battle to bring them to justice, it’s more important than ever to point out the naked truth regarding corrupt, self-serving officials instead of swallowing the lies they deck themselves in. This story is foundational in teaching those young and old that change can begin when someone has the courage to say that the Emperor has no clothes.

We begin with an introduction to our titular character, an emperor who prioritizes his appearance over running his country. His cabinet meetings are devoted to choosing the finest and fanciest outfits to wear. When money for his wardrobe grows scarce, he simply raises the taxes on his weary populace. The Emperor’s high fashion standards extend to the rest of his court and even his own military: the uniform is so outrageously ornate and expensive that he can only afford to have one soldier serve as his entire army. It’s a new detail that perfectly plays into the absurdity and satire of the original story. The people should have nothing to fear when their tyrannical ruler has just a single person to enforce violence on them, but it takes a small push for them to realize it.

Enter Bo and Morty, two swindlers on the run after their latest scheme went belly-up. Bo’s ready to try their luck in the next village, but the elderly Morty is sick of the con life. Over Bo’s protests he admits he wants to go straight, even casually tossing around the idea of starting up a duck farm.

“We can make cute little videos of them waddling around, eating bowls of peas and ice water from Dunkin Donuts. The kids will love it, I presume!”

They arrive in town just in time for the Emperor’s mandatory weekly fashion show. Sensing his majesty’s a prime mark, Bo drags Morty into a tavern and tries to get him in on one last hustle. Morty wants nothing to do with it, but sympathizes with the townsfolk when they enter complaining how they bear the costs of the Emperor’s tastes. It’s gotten to the point where they’re on the brink of starvation. Even the tavernkeeper, a saucy wench named Maggie, worries she’ll have to close her doors for good if things don’t change soon. So Morty plays along with Bo, claiming that they’re fabulous tailors hoping to offer their services to the Emperor.

Word reaches the Emperor regarding these sartorially-talented newcomers and he insists on meeting them. Bo and Morty bait him well: they claim that they’re the only men in the world capable of weaving a cloth so refined that it’s totally invisible to anyone who’s unfit for their job or incredibly stupid. The Emperor immediately gives them all the gold and supplies they ask for in return for an entire wardrobe’s worth of their fantastical cloth. The charlatans shack up in the palace and get to work faking it until they make it, as it were.

Talk of Bo and Morty’s amazing technicolor dream cloth sweeps the town. The Emperor is eager to see their progress but fears he won’t be able to. So he sends his unctuous prime minister instead. The prime minister is horrified when he can’t see anything, but pretends to be amazed by the “cloth” on display.

“My goodness, it’s so dark, so shiny and round. I can see myself reflected in it!” “That’s the camera, sir.”

After congratulating themselves on their cleverness, Morty visits the tavern to wet his whistle. But Maggie is less than welcoming towards him. She vents about the financial straits the Emperor’s vanity has them in, and despises Bo and Morty for enabling it. Morty tells Bo he wants to take the Emperor for all he’s worth to stick it to the pompous prick, which…didn’t we already get all this from the previous tavern scene? The acting is nice to be sure, but I feel we gleaned Maggie’s frustration and Morty’s change of heart and motivations the first time around.

Anyway, the Emperor talks himself into seeing the cloth only to order the next person he meets, the minister of finance, to do it for him. We get a repeat of the prime minister’s reaction complete with stares into the camera and inner monologues. Both ministers praise the magnificent job the tailors are doing, and the Emperor has them arrange a parade to show off his new suit once it’s ready. In private, the two men try to outdo each other in regards to what they “saw” and catch them in their lies. It’s a great moment absent from any version of the story I’m familiar with; a fascinating display of power struggle between these ignoble flatterers who would climb over each other to remain in the Emperor’s highest confidence.

Bo and Morty prepare to pack up their gains and cheese it when the Emperor finally shows up to view their work. Indeed, he’s struck dumb by what he can’t see. Though obviously terrified that he’s either unfit or too stupid to be Emperor, he declares that he’ll knight his tailors on the morrow and shower them with even more wealth. The pair are eager to skip town before they’re forced to leave behind whatever they can’t carry, but the royal army is stationed outside their door to prevent anyone from disturbing their final night of work. So Morty and Bo wile away the hours pretending to weave, sew and cut for the townsfolk watching them through the window.

Come morning, the exhausted con men put on a big show of “dressing” the Emperor before his court, who play along at seeing his clothes for fear of losing their status. The Emperor strolls out on the streets wearing nothing but his bloomers. Then a random boy shouts out the truth, that he’s as naked as a jay bird. The crowd quickly turns on the Emperor…too quickly, as a matter of fact. This is a huge turning point in the story that deserves more time to unfold. Just one word from the kid shouldn’t change everyone’s mind all at once. There wasn’t even any buildup or tension with the crowd faking their admiration at the risk of being thought idiots. The people were already dismissive of the Emperor’s clothing obsession. It counts for their quick reversal but greatly diminishes the climax. Plus, the boy sounds like he’s reading his line off a cue card instead of innocently stating the obvious, which further softens the impact his bluntness should have.

The narrator’s a liar, too. That’s not a “small child”, he’s practically pubescent.

The Emperor throws a tantrum, showing what a giant man-baby he truly is. Realizing how exposed he is (in more ways than one), he runs for the safety of his palace. And that’s when the fed-up plebeians pelt him with rotten fruit and chase him and his cronies out of town.

“Do you hear the people sing, singing the songs of angry men? It is the music of a people who will not be slaves to fashion again!”

Bo and Morty aren’t witness to this peasant uprising as they wisely fled to the hills beforehand. When Bo questions where Morty’s share of the gold is, he admits he left it at Maggie’s tavern for her to spruce it up and donate the rest to the needy. Bo’s all “You’ve gone soft Morty, but dammit I just can’t stay mad at you” and they go off to raise their ducks together. As for the Emperor, he finally learned his lesson and started acting like a good ruler should instead of just dressing the part.

I like The Emperor’s New Clothes enough to say that I wish I liked it more. I enjoy Bo and Morty’s dynamic; it’s one of the few times the swindlers are in a morally gray area, defrauding someone for the good of the people. Comedian Dick Shawn is a tremendously wonderful ham (or is it a wonderfully tremendous ham?), channeling Jack Lemmon’s Prince Hapnick to play the vain, childish Emperor. The elaborate period costumes are lovely too, as is to be expected. It does, however, share the same issue that plagues many Hans Christian Andersen adaptations. The need to stretch out the story to fit the runtime results in plenty of filler and repeats of scenes that already established characters and motives. They’re performed well, at the very least. Anderen’s digs at the out of-touch, sycophantic elite remain as timely as ever, which would mean something if the big reveal hit its mark. Sadly, it doesn’t, and the story needs to in order for its message to reach its full potential.

Notes:

  • Shelley Duvall’s the nicest she’s looked in any of the intros thus far. Here she sports a pretty yellow blouse, pearls, has her hair up with yellow flowers, and sports the heart-shaped birthmark that the Emperor plays around with throughout the episode. I normally don’t keep track of how Duvall appears, but since this is a fashion-heavy episode I thought I’d bring it up.
  • We get a signpost in the woods labeling the scene transition shortly before Bo and Morty make their way into the story. We need more clever transitions like this in our media.
  • My favorite shot in the episode is the pan across the room capturing everyone’s reactions to the Emperor’s “clothes”. Bo, Morty, and the minister of finance are in open-mouthed shock, the prime minister has a painfully forced grin on his face, and two of the ladies? Well, they really like what they see.
  • There’s not much in the way of physical comedy, but I love the blocking of the scene where Bo and Morty reel in the Emperor. They start on their knees and consistently lower themselves whenever the Emperor does the more they intrigue him, ending with the Emperor and his men on their hands and knees while the unscrupulous pair lie on the floor.
  • Yes, I’m aware that the minister of finance viewing the cloth was part of the original tale which helps make the lie that he, the prime minister and the Emperor tell themselves into a rule of three.
  • There’s multiple variations on how the written story ends from region to region. The original has the deeply embarrassed Emperor continue his promenade in an effort to save face. Some versions have the Emperor reward the boy with a bag of gold for his honesty. I heard about one version where the Emperor has the boy and his family black-bagged that was supposedly printed in certain fascist countries to discourage uprisings but couldn’t find it, which is probably for the best.
  • The last time we see the Emperor he’s donated his fine clothes to the poor and announces he’ll be giving them a free dinner on the condition that they bathe. Baby steps, I guess…

Hey, Was That…?: Alan Arkin and Art Carney play Bo and Morty. Barrie Ingham, whom I will forever fondly associate with the voice of Basil from The Great Mouse Detective, is the minister of finance. Respected character actor of stage and film Clive Revill is the prime minister; he played the same role in the Cannon Movie Tales adaptation of The Emperor’s New Clothes two years later. Georgia Brown, who originated the role of Nancy in Oliver!, plays Maggie the tavernkeeper. Timothy Dalton narrates. Peter Medak previously directed the Faerie Tale Theatre episodes of Snow White, Pinocchio, and The Snow Queen.

Who’s The Artist?: This time the designers drew not from a specific artist, but a time period. The Emperor’s wardrobe and palace are clearly modeled after King Louis XIV of France and the decadent Versailles court.

Better or Worse Than…: It’s no surprise a story as humorous yet enlightening as The Emperor’s New Clothes would be adapted multiple times, though many of the versions I found were mainly geared towards children. Like most of Hans Christian Andersen tales, it was adapted for the series The Fairytaler; the Emperor in this one is brought down by the granddaughter of his former tailor pointing out his nakedness. HBO’s Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child is a fun ride thanks to setting the action in feudal Japan with the voices of Gedde Watanabe and George Takei, but for some reason it’s the only episode not available on HBO Max (I suspect it’s because this Emperor’s underclothes leave little to the imagination). HBO also produced an animated adaptation titled The Emperor’s Newest Clothes in 2018, but apart from the interesting art style it’s terrible. Alan Alda’s talents are wasted, and it ends with the girl who speaks out being punished but somehow twisting it around to be an uplifting message reflecting recent political resistance and it’s a huge mess. Rankin-Bass made a stop-motion TV special as a pilot for a series starring Danny Kaye re-enacting famous stories and it’s actually pretty good. Speaking of Danny Kaye, The Emperor’s New Clothes is one of several stories adapted to song in his beloved movie Hans Christian Andersen; my favorite cover is by Mandy Patinkin. I have a soft spot for Hallmark’s Timeless Tales version because of who voices the Emperor (hint: he’s a lion AND a tiger). Finally, there’s Muppet Classic Theatre’s resoundingly hilarious version with Fozzie as the Emperor and Rizzo as one of the swindlers. This Muppetational retelling does an excellent job emphasizing the importance of thinking for yourself and being a true individual.

So where does Faerie Tale Theatre’s version stand? If this were a ranking I’d say somewhere in the upper-middle. The acting is good, the characters are well-developed and there’s some great humorous lines, but the satire and lesson don’t hit quite as hard as they should.

Ranking: The Emperor’s New Clothes gets the new Number 14 spot between Jack and the Beanstalk and The Snow Queen.

Next time on Faerie Tale Theatre, I can show you a whole new world…well, whole new for 80’s television at least. It’s Aladdin and His Wonderful Lamp.

Thank you for reading! Faerie Tale Theatre reviews are posted on the 6th of each month. Special thanks to my generous patrons Amelia Jones, Sam Flemming, Robert Barnette, and Matthew Bond 007. Anyone who joins the Patreon party can get such fun perks as sneak peeks of reviews, extra votes, movie requests and more!