Although set amid the fictional Mayflower Kennel Club Dog Show in Philadelphia, the comedy is really concerned with five sets of the contestants’ owners, including — but not limited to — a longtime married couple (Catherine O’Hara and co-writer Eugene Levy), two gay men (Michael McKean and John Michael Higgins) and a lonely woodsman (Guest).
As individually idiosyncratic and entertaining as they are (and are they ever!) the show that is Show is stolen by Fred Willard as Mayflower co-host Buck Laughlin, irritating his fellow commentator Jim Piddock (The Dictator) with inane questions, like how much a dog could bench press, and who-asked-you observations, i.e. “He went for her like she’s made outta ham.”
Even on my fifth viewing, but my first via Warner Home Video’s brand-new Blu-ray, his clueless and inappropriate patter never gets old. Willard truly deserved a nomination from Oscar; ditto the screenplay, although no telling how much of it was improvised. —Rod Lott
This article appears in Mar 6-12, 2013.