One of Gene Wilder’s most personally important movies was shot in Boston
The late actor met — and fell in love with — Gilda Radner while filming ‘Hanky Panky.’
When beloved actor Gene Wilder passed away Monday at the age of 83, fans bemoaned the loss of the man who starred in Blazing Saddles, Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, The Producers, and Young Frankenstein. Less mentioned was the 1982 suspense-comedy Hanky Panky, in which Wilder starred as an architect wrongfully pursued in a murder case.The movie, which featured several scenes filmed at the New England Aquarium and Beacon Hill, received mixed reviews. “There are two genuine laughs in the entire film,” wrote Vincent Canby of The New York Times. “The rest is not silence but noise, various Wilder shticks and some romancing between the two stars.” But the romancing between the two stars is why the film was so important to Wilder. He fell in love with his costar, Gilda Radner, to whom he was married from 1984 until her death from ovarian cancer in 1989.Dan Laughlin, the aquarium’s assistant curator for fishes who worked there back when Hanky Panky was filming, told The Boston Globe that the actor was “genuinely warm, affable, and very accommodating despite a busy shooting schedule.”Check out the trailer for Hanky Panky below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPtRLU5XmKk
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