Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

In like Flynn (Errol that is).

I think this is the origin of the expression.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Like_Flint

I don't think so:

http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_156.html

This is from your site :

The title is a parody of the phrase "In like Flynn", referring to Errol Flynn's reputation as a womanizer (which he shares with Flint).

I do see your point Bob and you could be dead right too. However, as far as I can recall nobody that I knew in the South part of England that I grew up in ever said "in like Flynn" When they used this slang expression they all said "in like flint"

YMMV of course.

Ah, that's it. Old Errol was well known around here, that scoundrel (dripping with envy of course).

Give this guy a 360 and he'll be ready to rock.

Yes he was a frisky little Tassie Devil old Errol! I'm sorry Brian but I have to agree with Bob on this one. BTW I followed your advice and "I'm in like Flynn" and had a reply from Roy.

LOL. That's great Ron. Maybe it's just a cultural thing at the end of the day. Who knows? Most of us (for years after the war ended) were so poor we couldn't afford to go the the 'pictures' as we called the movie theatre. I never heard of Errol until well past my teen years.

Brian must have been a southern thing in UK, being a northerner never heard the saying , in fact when you first mentioned it I thought it was something to do with the movie Our Man Flint as follow up to that was In Like Flint. (James Coburn)

That was my first thought also, Roy....... James Coburn has always been one of my favourites!

“What is the derivation of in like Flynn?”

Reference books almost universally assert that this set phrase, an American expression meaning to be successful emphatically or quickly, especially in regard to sexual seduction, refers to the Australian-born actor Errol Flynn. His drinking, drug-taking and sexual exploits were renowned, even for Hollywood, but the phrase is said to have been coined following his acquittal in February 1943 for the statutory rape of a teenage girl. This seems to be supported by the date of the first example recorded, in American Speech in December 1946, which cited a 1945 use in the sense of something being done easily.

The trouble with this explanation is that examples of obviously related expressions have now turned up from dates before Flynn’s trial. Barry Popik of the American Dialect Society found an example from 1940, as well as this from the sports section of the San Francisco Examiner of 8 February 1942: “Answer these questions correctly and your name is Flynn, meaning you’re in, provided you have two left feet and the written consent of your parents”. To judge from a newspaper reference he turned up from early 1943, the phrase could by then also be shortened to I’m Flynn, meaning “I’m in”.

It’s suggested by some writers that the phrase really originated with another Flynn, Edward J Flynn — “Boss” Flynn — a campaign manager for the Democratic party during FDR’s presidency. Flynn’s machine in the South Bronx in New York was so successful at winning elections that his candidates seemed to get into office automatically.

The existence of the examples found by Mr Popik certainly suggest the expression was at first unconnected with Errol Flynn, but that it shifted its association when he became such a notorious figure. Since then, it has altered again, because in 1967 a film, In Like Flint, a spy spoof starring James Coburn, took its title by wordplay from the older expression, and in turn caused many people to think that the phrase was really in like Flint.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-inl1.htm

Thanks for the info Mark,

So it would seem that us 'Southerners' actually bastardised an old expression. So why does that not surprise me? LOL

James Harrison Coburn... RIP


The Flint series of films was a cashing in on the James Bond craze, so Flint being the 'original man of mystery' is a bit of a stretch.

Would it be too much of a giveaway to ask what year this live version was recorded?

Really an exceptional voice.

Track recorded in December 72 in Manchester UK.

Released on a live album in 73.