Doctor Detroit (1983) review

Clifford Skridlow (Dan Aykroyd), a comparative literature professor at debt-ridden Monroe College (which is run by his father), unwittingly gets dragged into a risky situation with Chicago-based pimp "Smooth" Walker (Howard Hesseman) and feared mobster "Mom" (Kate Murtagh) - Walker convinces "Mom" that an underworld figure named "Doctor Detroit" is about to take over her territory, which forces Skridlow to assume the role while Walker leaves the country.  The script (by Bruce Jay Friedman, Carl Gottlieb and Robert Boris) is considerably less amusing than anything Saturday Night Live put out at the time, and once Hesseman (one of my favorite character actors) is gone from the movie it loses most of its appeal: I'm not sure who thought it was a good idea to have Aykroyd play a "mack" - complete with gawdy suit, bad wig and an armored glove - with that obnoxious voice and those embarrassing mannerisms, but he (or they) needed to be thrown in Comedy Prison.  To its credit, it does show the "resourcefulness" of the "lower class" - Walker's prostitutes (including Donna Dixon and Fran Drescher) and chauffeur Diavolo (T. K. Carter) are immensely helpful to bookish Clifford - and suggests that institutions of higher learning are fundamentally no different than pimps (the last scene has the Monroe College dinner in the same building as the Players Ball) ... although I might be reading too much into it.  Thankfully, it was never followed up with a sequel.