Trying to top the tributes

Irving Berlin made it. So did George Abbott. George Burns squeaked by for a few weeks before leaving us. But there's really not much precedent for this day. Indeed, it's arguable that no American cultural figure with the standing of a Bob Hope has ever reached his 100th birthday.

His career is so full and his accomplishments so vast that it's hard to even sum them up on such an occasion. Vaudeville, Broadway, radio, television, movies, concerts. He mastered them all -- and made it look so easy we barely noticed his brilliance.

Above all else, this one-time aspiring professional boxer from Eltham, England, became the symbol of American home-front support for its troops abroad, entertaining the boys in USO shows in every conflict between World War II and the first Gulf War.

Moreover, he became the wealthiest entertainer of his generation (mostly from real-estate investments), he was a successful author (12 best sellers between 1941 and 1990) and he's been happily married to his wife, Dolores, for close to 70 years (she just turned 94).

The Guinness Book of World Records claims he's the "most-honored entertainer" in history, with more than 1,500 individual awards, citations and honorary doctorates for his humanitarian work. He's been knighted by the queen, blessed by the pope and toasted by the emperor of Japan.

In his time, he's been awarded the Presidential Freedom Medal, decorated with full Kennedy Center honors, voted no less than five honorary Oscars and ranked among the top five of just about every poll ever taken of Most Admired Americans.

Yes, it's true that many people turned on him in the Vietnam era, and there's that 1993 biography by Arthur Marx (Groucho's son) that makes him out as a "petty tyrant" who rigged beauty contests for sexual favors and made all those USO trips to chase women.

But that's all mostly forgotten now, his USO contributions seem especially impressive in our post-Iraq War militaristic glow (as usual, his timing is perfect) and you're not likely to find too many people who will say a word against him.

In the face of this, is there any new tribute that can be given him? It's a tall order, but they're trying. The Navy has named a ship after him, the Library of Congress has opened a "Bob Hope Gallery of Entertainment" and Hollywood and Vine is being renamed "Bob Hope Square" today.

Meanwhile, there's an exhibit of his USO career touring the country (it's currently at the Reagan Library), NBC has aired a birthday special, both A&E and the BBC have tributes and Hyperion has published a birthday tie-in book called "Bob Hope: My Life in Jokes."

Hope himself will not be taking part in any of the festivities. According to his friend, Associated Press reporter Bob Thomas, his health has deteriorated, he can no longer communicate and "he may be unaware of all the celebrations for his 100th."

But Hope Enterprises, now mostly run by his daughter, Linda, is doing its part, and the "Bob Hope Store" on its Web site, www.bobhope.com, is offering birthday special deals on a range of videos and DVD collections of Hope's TV work and USO concerts.

Also out for the birthday is Universal Home Video's new "Bob Hope DVD Tribute Collection" -- four of the "Road" pictures and 16 other films compiled in 12 separately sold DVD packages (several are double bills), with a few underwhelming bonus features on each.

In preparation for this story, I watched these and a half dozen other Hope films, and my surprise at how well they hold up speaks to what many Hope fans think is the great irony of his brilliant career: the fact that he never got any critical respect for his movie work.

In a 30-year Hollywood career, Hope starred in 55 films, almost all of them major studio releases and big popular successes. He was a Top 10 movie star draw each year from 1941 to '53 (No. 1 in 1950) -- putting him in the same movie-star league as John Wayne.

But, as far as I know, he has never been the subject of a serious critical study, he was never nominated for an Academy Award (his Oscars are all for public service) and he was never honored by one of the major film festivals. It's possible that he never got a good review.

The critical consensus is that he was a marginal movie talent who delivered topical gags he didn't write in the same mechanical style and otherwise mugged his way through a series of movies that are on the same artistic level as the work of Abbott & Costello and the Bowery Boys.

And I think it's undeniable that the topicality of the humor and in-jokes tends to date his films more than many other golden-age movie comics. There's also a lot of corny business and silly eye- rolling and unnecessary songs that can distance us from the material.

But the skill of Hope's delivery and ad-libbing virtuosity in these films often take the breath away, and his running interplay with Bing Crosby in the seven "Road" pictures is pure poetry -- truly, they were one of the screen's great comedy teams.

Ironically, Hope's biggest admirer in this department is the most lauded of all modern movie comedians, Woody Allen. He's on record as saying the Hope films are among his "all-time favorites" and he considers Bob Hope "the most underrated of all comedy filmmakers."

"I really don't know why Bob has never gotten any respect from the critics," he said in a 2001 Seattle interview. "To me, his movies are hilarious, and his character is as well-defined and psychologically complex as W.C. Fields."

So it's not unthinkable that these movies will end up being Hope's greatest legacy, and 100 years from now -- when the USO and his honors are long forgotten -- our descendents might be thanking him for the memories of "The Road to Morocco," "The Paleface" and "The Lemon Drop Kid."

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