A Film Feast for Fans of the Original ‘Thin Man’ Series

So Broadway didn’t quite know what to do with “The Thin Man,” a.k.a “Nick and Nora,” $4.3 million and months of tinkering notwithstanding?

Producers didn’t have to look any further than the original film series, recently issued as a tempting six-film boxed laser set by Turner MGM/UA Home Video (“The Thin Man Collection,” $125), to discover why these witty films resist further adaptation.

In fact, with the well-conceived chapter stops detailed on the inside back cover, you can immediately see how a well-matched William Powell and Myrna Loy lured audiences into theaters from 1934 to 1947 to see Nick and Nora Charles and their stubborn terrier Asta solve crimes and banter. The original theatrical trailers on Side 12 crackle with the wit and sophistication of this spicy husband-and-wife detective team who proved there was laughter, to say nothing of fun-filled love, after marriage--even with a few dozen too many martinis.

The clever first trailer, pitching the original 1934 film, pits a dashing Nick in a Dashiell Hammett book cover, against Powell in an earlier film incarnation as detective Philo Vance, a delightful conceit.

None other than cinematographer James Wong Howe shot the first of what became the popular--and almost never-ending--series initially written by Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, based on the Hammett novel, and directed by W.S. Van Dyke. (The actual “thin man” wasn’t really Nick, but the name stuck to the sequels, just in case audiences couldn’t make the connection.)

The black-and-white transfer to laser is crisp and clear and the total 10 hours and 36 minutes fall into as many 90-minute or so films as you can take in one sitting. Along the way, there are some deft turns by Maureen O’Sullivan, Jimmy Stewart, Dean Stockwell (as Nick Jr.), Gloria Grahame, Sheldon Leonard, Cesar Romero and Keenan Wynn.

After watching the first two “Thin ‘Men’ ” you can see why Broadway tried so hard to recapture the zest and wit of this dynamite duo; TV has tried some too, though a little more successfully (the ‘50s series with Peter Lawford and Phyllis Kirk as Nick and Nora, “Moonlighting,” “Hart to Hart,” “Remington Steele”).

But maybe the “Thin Man” films are best appreciated just for themselves, including “After the Thin Man” (1936), “Another Thin Man” (1939), “Shadow of the Thin Man” (1941), “The Thin Man Goes Home” (1944) and “Song of the Thin Man” (1947).

Try the original, and best, “Thin Man” for starters:

Nick: I’m a hero. I was shot twice in the Tribune.

Nora: I read you were shot five times in the tabloids.

Nick: It’s not true. He didn’t come anywhere near my tabloids.

And no one has come any closer since.