The Nutty Professor

The Nutty Professor is a 1963 American comedy directed by Jerry Lewis, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Bill Richmond. Lewis stars as Julius Kelp, a shy, clumsy chemistry professor whose students and colleagues treat him with little respect. After a humiliating encounter with a muscular student, Kelp devises a formula that transforms him into Buddy Love, a confident, smooth-talking ladies' man. The potion's effects are temporary and wear off without warning, forcing Kelp to retreat before anyone glimpses his ordinary self again. Complicating matters, the student he secretly admires, Stella Purdy, played by Stella Stevens, is drawn to the arrogant Buddy rather than the man behind him.

The film retells the Jekyll-and-Hyde idea as a campus comedy, with Lewis playing both the timid professor and his brash alter ego. The supporting cast includes Del Moore as Dr. Warfield, Kathleen Freeman as Millie Lemmon, Henry Gibson as a college student, and Richard Kiel in an uncredited appearance as a man in the gym. Ernest D. Glucksman produced for Paramount and Jerry Lewis Productions, and the film runs 107 minutes.

The Nutty Professor was released in June 1963 and was the first feature Lewis directed, followed years later by Which Way to the Front? On IMDb it holds a rating of 6.6 from around 21,000 votes, and on TMDB 6.5 from roughly 486 votes. The critics' rating stands at 6.6 from 29 reviews, close to the audience scores on both sites.