John Austin looks like "Adams Family" patriarch Gomez Adams decked out from hat to toe in a solid black outfit in director Jerry Paris' made-for-television western farce "Evil Roy Slade" as the eponymous desperado who struggles to go straight after he falls in love with a beautiful woman of virtue. Writers Jerry Belson and "Pretty Woman's" Garry Marshall manage to contrive some amusing situations with shameless gags. Everything in "Evil Roy Slade," however, isn't always shameless. Nevertheless, you suspect these tongue-in-cheek scribes must have been searching something different when they promoted the villain to the status of the hero. Austin is in top-form as the dastardly outlaw. Comedian Dick Shawn cuts a quite figure as Marshal Bing Bell, a singing cowpoke with a guitar that conceals a rifle with which he is an excellent marksman. Bing dangles a tiny bell from his right earlobe. The running gag is that whenever anybody says Bing Bell, the other person mistakenly thinks that they are referring to the chimes of a door bell. No, it's not as hilarious as the old lady's name, Frau Blücher, in "Young Frankenstein," but Belson and Marshall deserve credit for a full-fledged effort. By this time, television had gotten around to acknowledging the presence of gay men, and the characters here make two references to them as "funny boys." Although this goofy, lowbrow western is predictable, "Evil Roy Slade" has its side-splitting seconds.Evil Roy Slade (John Austin of "The Adams Family") and his ruffians are robbing a bank when our anti-heroic hero encounters beautiful Betsy Potter (Pamela Austin of "Rome Adventure") and plants a big wet one on her moist, pretty lips. Suddenly, everything changes for Roy. Roy wants Betsy almost as much as he embraces evil. Roy and his gang set out to rob the stagecoach, and Flossie (Edie Adams of "The Apartment") turns informant when he ditches her to conclude his career as an outlaw. Roy and company discover her treachery when they try to rob a stagecoach jammed with an army of lawmen, including midgets on the roof. One of these tykes, (Billy Curtis of "High Plains Drifter") springs out of a box to tackle Roy. The posse captures Roy, locks him up, and the court sentences him to swing. Beleaguered railroad president Nelson Stool (Mike Rooney of "The Secret Invasion"), who Roy and his gang have been preying on mercilessly for years, leaves his drooling bulldog to guard Roy as well as his incompetent relative, Clifford Stool (Henry Gibson of "The Long Goodbye"). Stool has tied Roy's hands behind his back so that Roy cannot escape. Shrewdly, Roy plays of the hunger of the starving dog, drenches his bonds with gravy, and the dog gnaws through them and Roy escapes. Eventually, Roy succumbs to Betsy's charms and they move to Boston where he visit a shrink Logan Delp (Dom DeLuise of "Blazing Saddles") and can walk around without his hardware. Roy ends up selling shoes for Uncle Harry Fern (Milton Berle of "Whispering Ghosts") and becomes rather adept at it. Temptation overwhelms our protagonist when Harry entrusts Roy with lugging two bulging bags of currency to the Boston Bank. Roy delivers the loot but then purloins the bank guard's revolver and holds up the bank. The front page newspaper story reveals that Roy is heading back east. The elder Stool finally persuades Marshal Bell to intervene.Some of the priceless gags occur when Roy strolls up the street in a western town during an early scene. He triggers shots into the ground at the toes of an invalid (Leonard Barr of "Diamonds Are Forever")whose legs are encased in plaster and relies on crutches to walk. Roy takes an elderly woman's shawl from her shoulders as she is poised to cross a muddy street and lays the shawl on the muddy spot. Instead of waiting for the old woman to lead off, Roy tramps on it as he goes his merry way. A woman sitting on a horse extends her hand so that Roy may help her descend from the steed. Instead, Roy pulls her off the pony and appropriates it for himself. At one point, when he announces his impending retirement from the gang, Roy passes out autographed wanted posters of himself. At another point, Roy terrorizes a sleeping infant when Betsy prohibits him from frightening adults. Happily, "Evil Roy Slade" just makes the grade, especially with its big finale in the church at Betsy's wedding. John Austin radiates evil like the dastard that he plays would and Dick Shawn is funny at Bing Bell.

"Who's that guy?" "Bing Bell." (for that is indeed the Sheriff's name)"Is that the door?" OK, so it looks a bit lame written down, but take it from me, you'll be dissolved in laughter long before you reach this point. 'Evil Roy Slade' is right up there with Bud Hill & Terence Spencer's 'My Name Is Trinity/Trinity Is Still My Name' and James Garner's 'Skin Game' in the sadly forgotten comedy western sub-genre. The terrific John Astin was never better than in this undeservedly forgotten comedy classic.

Super comedy, let's have this on DVD. I watched this movie as a teenager with my family and we loved it! My dad was a big western fan and he laughed all the way through the movie. My brothers and I grew up on classic westerns and then the anti-hero westerns of Clint Eastwood. I for one did not believe that a western could also be a comedy. This film really works. Evil Roy is a memorable character and will make you chuckle for days, weeks and years after wards. This movie has great performances and a script that is funny by parodying the genre. However there is nothing mean or nasty here, there is a real affection for the traditional western.

This film is as funny as - Support Your Local Sheriff (1969), Support Your Local Gunfighter (1971), They Call Me Trinity (1971), Blazing Saddles (1974).Yes its that good. I only got the one chance to watch it all those years ago as a youngster. I would love to have the chance to laugh again with this film....One hopes that someone see sense and releases this on DVD, so that a new generation has a chance to see this TV movie.The best part of the movie is when he is trying to turn good. You really do laugh as he tries so hard to be good.Carl Brown Ipswich, England