Off to The Ritz with Treat and Googie ...

Terence McNally's play THE RITZ about the farcical goings-on at a gay sauna seemed an odd choice for Richard Lester in 1976 - the year he also did ROBIN AND MARIAN, but actually it suits his madcap humour, so evident in those '60s Beatles films A HARD DAY'S NIGHT and HELP!, plus THE KNACK, PETULIA, oddities like HOW I WON THE WAR and THE BEDSITTING ROOM and those '70s entertainments like his MUSKETEERS films, ROYAL FLASH and the tense JUGGERNAUT - see reviews at Lester label. 

Gaetano to avoid a "hit" on him by Carmine, tells a cab driver to take him where Carmine can't find him. He is taken to The Ritz, a gay bathhouse where he is pursued amorously by "chubby chaser" Paul B. Price and by entertainer Googie Gomez who believes him to be a broadway producer. His guides through the Ritz are gatekeeper Abe, habitue Chris, and bellhop/go-go-boys Tiger and Duff. Squeaky-voiced detective Michael Brick and his employer Carmine locate Gateano at the Ritz, as does his wife Vivian. It gets funnier and funnier ....

Gaetano: Listen, there's something I have to tell you...

Chris: You're not gay?

Gaetano: [relieved] No!

Chris: What, are you a social worker or something?

Gaetano: No, but I didn't know that everyone in here was...

Chris: GAY! See? It's not a bad word. You might try using it sometime.

Gaetano: You mean to tell me that everyone in here is gay?

Chris: God, I hope so. Otherwise I just paid ten dollars to walk around in a towel in front of a bunch of Shriners.

The cast is uniformly amusing, especially Rita Moreno as Googie Gomez, an untalented Latin singer whom Weston mistakes for a drag queen. She frequently steals the show from everyone. Moreno got a Tony Award for her Broadway portrayal of that role. Also good is the improbably squeaky-voiced detective played by Treat Williams. 
Some of the resulting mayhem is very funny indeed; some stretches are more ho-hum. Nevertheless, it is a generally successful piece of entertainment regardless of one's sexual orientation.

We know Rita Moreno from way back to THE KING AND I; Jack Weston always amuses, as in THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR and CACTUS FLOWER, and Treat was a treat in Forman's HAIR, Lumet's PRINCE OF THE CITY and as Stanley to Ann-Margret's Blanche in that ;80s television STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE. F.Murray Abraham (AMADEUS Oscar-winner) is a scream as Chris, and then there is Vivian Vance ... The humour is broad farce and the gays are not treated meanly. Lester keeps it all bubbling nicely, The reviewers at IMDB loved it, 

Summer views: A Streetcar Named Desire, 1984

I have just watched the 1984 versison of A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE with Ann-Margret and Treat Williams, which I imagined would be Tennessee-lite, but was very involving and emotional, with great art-direction and that late 1940s look. Is it a quality production of the play, is Ann a creditable Blanche?

I have liked Ann in several items lately (like THE TWO MRS GRENVILLES and her 1966 THE PLEASURE SEEKERS, as per label here) and she seems to be ticking all the boxes here, even if too shrill at the start but by the second half she is terrific. No one could ever be as good as Vivien Leigh but Ann has a creditable stab, with all those lines we know: about the Tarntula Arms, and "I don't want realism, I want magic", "deliberate cruelty is unforgiveable" and of course "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers" for that great climax. Beverely D'Angelo is good too as Stella.

Stanley though is Treat Williams who seems to have bulked up and looks sexy enough. He plays him as an infantile brute. Treat was fun in THE RITZ and in HAIR and great in PRINCE OF THE CITY (and still looks good now), (Treat label), but Brando he ain't. 

Looking at it again it seems a very cruel work, as Blanche is stripped of everything and Kowalski gets away with raping her, as she is carried off to the looneybin.

It is also well directed by John Erman (who has done a lot of 'gay interest' items: AN EARLY FROST, Anne again in OUR SONS and THE TWO MRS GRENVILLES, Lee Remick's THE LETTER, THIS YEAR'S BLONDE, THE LAST BEST YEAR, Midler's STELLA etc), with Travilla dressing Ann, Sydney Guilaroff doing her hair, and Marvin Hamlish doing that rather good score.

I'd love to have seen Faye Dunaway and Jon Voight, or Jessica Lange and Alec Baldwin. Any other famous Blanches? The only one I saw on the stage was Claire Bloom's in London in 1974. (Claire Bloom label). Gillian Anderson is just about to open in a new production here in London. One has to feel a bit sorry for Jessica Tandy - the original Blanche with Brando in Kazan's first 1947 production, but the part became so associated with Vivien Leigh after the movie and her playing it in London.

Ann is certainly the most voluptuous Blanche - she knows her effect on men, maybe that is all she has left, as she is - as she says - all played out. The reason she makes the journey to New Orleans is because she has burned all her bridges after losing the family home and her reputation with her erratic behavior and poor judgment.  "They told me to take a streetcar named Desire, and then transfer to one called Cemeteries and ride six blocks and get off at -- Elysian Fields!" Desire and Cemeteries were actual streetcar lines in New Orleans and Elysian Fields is a street in the French Quarter (where Stella and Stanley live), but Williams used them as a metaphor. 

She strives to start anew but she can't escape her past nor her illness. Still, she refuses to see herself as she is but instead creates the illusion of what ought to be, and like an actress playing a role, shes very theatrical and selects her wardrobe with tremendous care. But it's a front. People with mental illness who try to pass themselves off as "normal" eventually begin to crack under the pressure. That's what happens to Blanche. She starts out seemingly normal, but eventually the facade wears off. She is now at a dead end (Elysian Fields). Elysian Fields in mythology is the land of the dead, ruled by Hades.
Ann still looks marvellous now in her 70s, in new series of RAY DONOVAN (right).

Next: more hot summer night movies: SUMMERTIME, 1995, and THE GREENGAGE SUMMER, 1961, and my favourite scene from A LETTER TO THREE WIVES ....

Discoveries

What happens when toys aren't needed anymore?. The first TOY STORY passed me by, I had no interest in a kids' cartoon about toys, though I loved Pixar's FINDING NEMO. Now suddenly as TOY STORY 3 hits the screens, I have fallen in love with TOY STORY 2 - so will have to see the other two... TOY STORY 2 is an endlessly charming and yes moving delight with superb animation and that fabulous range of toys - I particularly like Hamm the piggy bank! But Woody and Buzz are timeless creations too. This film has more to say about friendship, loss, loyalty and the value of life itself than any of the more mature epics - there are so many delightful moments:

It is Yard Sale Day and the toys are understandably tense. You see, Yard Sale Day means that the old toys go out to the sale. Woody has reason to be nervous, he's starting to show his age. Poor Weezie the Penguin was laid forgotten on Andy's bookcase and he promptly gets put in the sale box. It's up to Woody to save him, which he does. But he gets picked up by a greedy toy-collector named Al and taken to Al's Toy Barn. Seems Woody is pretty valuable and Al wants to sell him to a toy auction. Can Buzz and friends save him in time? Jessie the Yodelling Cowgirl is played brilliantly by Joan Cusack, and the toys have to face the fact that Andy their owner is growing up and will not need them any more as he goes to high school ... its all nicely worked out and it will be fascinating and emotional seeing how TOY STORY 3 finishes and of course Barbie gets her Ken! T S 2 has that splendid scene too where they have to cross the road which is brilliantly designed and directed - Pixar are genius! I am now feeling guilty about all those toys I casually discarded as I was growing up ...!

HAIR (1979). One of my best nights in the theatre was seeing A CHORUS LINE at Drury Lane in London on my 30th birthday in 1976. When the movie came along by Attenborough with Michael Douglas I had no interest in seeing it as I just knew it would not be the same experience [or even the same story] so I have never seen it. Its the same with HAIR although I did not see the stage version, but I know it was unique as a statement about the sixties, culture, war, music and race relations. We knew the songs at the time and there have been so many versions of them. Then the movie by Milos Forman came along in 1979 with choreography by Twyla Tharp, but again I gave it a miss - as it seemed a whole new story was created for the film which of course could not replicate the stage show. But now I have seen the movie and I like it a lot. Treat Williams as Berger leads a small group of anti-war hippes living in Central Park who happen upon Claude (John Savage) new in town, who has been drafted into the US Army for service in Vietnam. Beverly D'Angelo is the society girl he falls for, and Cheryl Barnes as Hud's discarded girlfriend sings "Easy To Be Hard" which is just plain astonishing. I only knew her from singing that terrific song "Love and Passion" for the soundtrack of Schrader's AMERICAN GIGOLO for the disco scene. I also like the look of the film and of course that choreography!

The hippies though come across as selfish and think nothing of wrecking a dinner party, stealing cars or begging for money - at least Treat Williams is terrific and looks the part, with or without clothes. Some scenes pack an emotional wallop like at the start as Claude and his father wait for the bus (reminiscent of my own father and me) and those soldiers heading off overseas - still topical today. I thought the general looked familiar: its director Nicholas Ray in his last appearance! Below: Treat in Richard Lester's THE RITZ with Jack Weston under the bed, and Rita Moreno as Googie Gomez!

EXPERIMENT IN TERROR. Lee Remick (subject of a forthcoming post here) had a big hit in 1962 with Blake Edwards' DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES. Edwards and Remick got together again the same year for the tense thriller EXPERIMENT IN TERROR (called THE GRIP OF FEAR here in the U.K.!) which never gets revived now, so its been good to finally see it on dvd now. Its quite creepy actually as bank clerk Remick is persuaded by the unseen (until the climax) villain Ross Martin to steal a lot of money from her bank and he persuades her by kidnapping her younger sister Stephanie Powers. Enter Glenn Ford as the detective on the case .... its fascinating and gripping as it unfolds.

Ford is a curious case - not forgotten but regularly overlooked in lists of great stars but he was one of the most dependable players from mid-40s [GILDA!, A STOLEN LIFE] to mid-60s, being a major player in the '50s where he could do it all: westerns (THE SHEEPMAN, COWBOY, JUBAL), dramas (THE BIG HEAT, THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE) and comedies (THE GAZEBO, THE COURTSHIP OF EDDIE'S FATHER) etc. He and Remick are a good team here and its still a very effective creepy thriller.

FATE IS THE HUNTER - Another Glenn Ford drama, from 1964, by Ralph Nelson, one of those proficient directors (like Robert Wise, J Lee Thompson, Richard Fleisher) who can work in any genre without any distinguishing trademark. This one re-unites THE BIRDS' Rod Taylor and Suzanne Pleshette as it features the aftermath of a plane crash where the only survivor is stewardess Pleshette (who is perfect here, as of course she is in everything, above with Tippi Hedren in THE BIRDS). Ford is the airline investigator whose pal Rod Taylor was the pilot of the plane so he has extra reason to discover what went wrong and quickly. The sterling cast also features Nancy Kwan who has a few scenes at the end, Jane Russell "as herself" in flashbacks and an unbilled Dorothy Malone who has a good scene as a ritzy socialite who was engaged briefly to Taylor, who is also dependable as ever here. This was a pleasant programmer at the time, good to see it again after 45+ years.