For someone whose rep was being the smartest guy in the room, Mike Nichols made more than his fair share of irredeemable stinkers. Never more so than in the pair of losers that ended his Hollywood honeymoon: DAY OF THE DOLPHIN/’73 (a talking porpoise political thriller), followed by this laugh-free period farce.* And how to explain Jack Nicholson & Warren Beatty signing on, lamentably cute as a couple of dim-witted conmen out to fleece Stockard Channing from her inheritance. The gimmick is that loverboy Warren’s not quite divorced, so gets Jack to step up to the altar so they can legally travel to California (the Mann Act, don’tcha know) and cash in. Theoretical hilarity ensues when Jack & Stockard cuckold Warren even though (wait for it) they’re the married couple! Then they bungle the murder. Bad as this all is, and under Nichols’ heaviest hand it’s very bad indeed, the boys do have a certain Mutt & Jeff physical aspect that carries a scene or two along. (Beatty, unexpectedly tall, can’t keep his head in the PanaVision frame.) Poor Stockard Channing has no such luck, perpetually irritating, with those chipmunk cheeks that more-or-less doomed her film career from the start. She might be leading the touring cast of something Barbara Harris or young Liza Minnelli was starring in on B’way. DESIGN FOR LIVING FOR DUMMIES?
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *To his credit, Nichols knew things had gone south and didn’t attempt another feature for nearly a decade.
WATCH THIS, NOT THAT: Liza Minnelli fell off her own career cliff in the other one gal/two dumb conmen flop of '75, LUCKY LADY. Clear the air with Lubitsch’s DESIGN FOR LIVING/’33.
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