Director: Woody Allen
Starring: John Cusack, Dianne Wiest, Jennifer Tilly, Chazz Palminteri, Jack Warden, Rob Reiner, Mary-Louise Parker
Running Time: 98 minutes
Synopsis: In New York City of the late 1920s, up-and-coming writer David Shayne (John Cusack) is desperate to have his latest play funded. His producer Julian Marx (Jack Warden) secures backing from mobster Nick Valenti (Joe Viterelli), on condition that Nick's talentless girlfriend Olive (Jennifer Tilly) lands a meaningful role. When rehearsals start, Nick appoints his goon Cheech (Chazz Palminteri) to keep an eye on Olive, who nevertheless encourages the lustful attention of past-his-prime and overeating actor Warner Purcell (Jim Broadbent). Meanwhile, David is falling in love with his leading lady Helen Sinclair (Dianne Wiest), while Cheech starts to make unsolicited suggestions to improve the play.
Running Time: 98 minutes
Synopsis: In New York City of the late 1920s, up-and-coming writer David Shayne (John Cusack) is desperate to have his latest play funded. His producer Julian Marx (Jack Warden) secures backing from mobster Nick Valenti (Joe Viterelli), on condition that Nick's talentless girlfriend Olive (Jennifer Tilly) lands a meaningful role. When rehearsals start, Nick appoints his goon Cheech (Chazz Palminteri) to keep an eye on Olive, who nevertheless encourages the lustful attention of past-his-prime and overeating actor Warner Purcell (Jim Broadbent). Meanwhile, David is falling in love with his leading lady Helen Sinclair (Dianne Wiest), while Cheech starts to make unsolicited suggestions to improve the play.
What Works Well: Woody Allen's mixture of behind-the-curtain chaos, mobster violence, and artist insecurities is a blast of fun entertainment. The script maintains razor sharpness and consistently finds quirks and twists within personalities and events, including Cheech masterfully gliding from edge-of-the-screen non-entity to a central character. Allen extracts deliciously loquacious performances from both Dianne Wiest (a fading diva desperate for continued relevance) and Jennifer Tilly (a gangster's moll ruthlessly exposing her deficiencies) as diametric opposites exploiting the stage for self-delusion. The clash between civility and crime nurtures commentary about academia and reality, and the separation of art and artist.
What Does Not Work As Well: In a rare example of a movie that could have benefitted from being longer, both Rob Reiner (as Sheldon Flender, a prolific but never-published playwright) and Mary-Louise Parker (as David Shayne's wife) deserved larger roles.
Key Quote:
Nick (to Julian, about Olive): Let's avoid confusion. She'll get some lines, or I'll nail your knee caps to the floor.
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