The Great Race won the film an Oscar. In his Top 10 Favorite Comedies video, Doug Walker cited Jack Lemmon's performance as Professor Fate as a major influence for his "Nostalgia Critic" internet persona. The Great Race The Great Race is a 1965 American Technicolor slapstick comedy film starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, and Natalie Wood, directed by Blake Edwards, written by Blake Edwards and Arthur A. Ross, and with music by Henry Mancini and cinematography by Russell Harlan. The supporting cast includes Peter Falk, Keenan Wynn, Arthur O'Connell and Vivian Vance. The movie cost US$12 million (equivalent to $ million in ),
Jack Lemmon stated that he knew he wanted to be an actor from the age of eight. Lemmon attended Phillips Academy (Class of 1943) and Harvard College (Class of 1947), where he lived in Eliot House and was an active member of several Drama Clubs – and president of the Hasty Pudding Club – as well as a member of the Delphic Club for Gentleman, a final club at Harvard. At Harvard, Lemmon was a member of the V-12 Navy College Training Program and was commissioned by the United States Navy, serving briefly as an ensign on an aircraft carrier during World