Micki & Maude | |
---|---|
Directed by | Blake Edwards |
Written by | Jonathan Reynolds |
Produced by | Tony Adams |
Starring | |
Cinematography | Harry Stradling Jr. |
Edited by | Ralph E. Winters |
Music by | Lee Holdridge |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 118 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $15.1 million [1] |
Box office | $26,200,000 |
Micki & Maude is a 1984 American romantic comedy film directed by Blake Edwards and starring Dudley Moore. It co-stars Tony Award-winning actress and dancer Ann Reinking as Micki and Amy Irving as Maude.
With the exception of appearances as herself, as in the documentary Mad Hot Ballroom in 2005, this was Reinking's last acting role in a film.
In India, this film was remade in Tamil as Rettai Vaal Kuruvi starring Mohan, Archana, and Rathika Sarathkumar, and directed by Balu Mahindra. It was also remade in Malayalam as Paavakoothu (1990) starring Jayaram, Parvathy and Ranjini. Tamil version was dubbed in Telugu as Rendu Thokala Pitta.
Rob Salinger (Dudley Moore) is an overworked tabloid television reporter. He is happily married to Micki (Ann Reinking), a lawyer who is a candidate to become a judge. Rob wants a child badly, but Micki is reluctant due to a previous miscarriage and wanting to focus on her career. On an assignment, Rob interviews a young cellist, Maude Guillory (Amy Irving). He is smitten with her and begins a relationship with her. When she becomes pregnant, the two decide to get married, with Maude and her father, professional wrestler Barkhas Guillory (Hard Boiled Haggerty), planning the wedding.
Rob prepares to confess to Micki and get a divorce. But before he can reveal his affair with Maude, Micki stuns him by announcing that she, too, is pregnant. She confesses that she initially planned on having an abortion as pregnancy would interfere with her career and not tell him, but realized how much she wants to have a family with him. However, she cannot exert or stress herself too much as it would endanger her and the baby. Rob becomes a bigamist. With his television boss and best friend Leo (Richard Mulligan) covering for him, he sees one wife during the daytime and the other at night, using work as an excuse. He gets away with it until the fates collide: Micki and Maude going into labor at the same time, in the same hospital, on the same floor.
The two women end up becoming friends, but realizing that Rob had been dishonest with them, they ban Rob from their lives and the lives of the children. Rob follows them around, spying on both families from a distance. Eventually, Rob reconciles with both Micki and Maude, though it is not clear if the two women are aware he has reconciled with the other. The film ends with the women pursuing their careers: Micki as a judge presiding in a courtroom, Maude playing cello in a symphony orchestra. The film closes with a shot of Rob in a park years later, with two babies and his six other children he has had over the years with Micki and Maude.
The script was written by playwright Jonathan Reynolds. "I initially thought that the guy would be perceived as terrible," said Reynolds. "The biggest trick was to make him not be a swine. If you'd had Errol Flynn or Warren Beatty in that role you would've been in big trouble." So Reynolds stressed the man's devotion to children and to make it clear he was very much in love with both wives. [2]
Blake Edwards was not originally available to direct. When Edwards left City Heat he moved on to Micki and Maude. "I feel I do my best work with him," said Moore. "He lets me go. He doesn't force me to feel that I'm not doing the right thing." [3]
The original version was set in New York and Reynolds says it was "sort of a slam-bang farce, with a very zippy pace." The director, said Reynolds, made it "much sweeter", slowed the pace and introduced the idea of one wife having a wrestler father. [2] Hard Boiled Haggerty, a professional wrestler, was subsequently cast as Micki's father, Barkhas Guillory, a father-in-law.
Along with Haggerty, the film features cameos from professional wrestlers Gene LeBell, Chief Jay Strongbow, Big John Studd, and André the Giant. Although the main cast also includes Wallace Shawn, it would not be until The Princess Bride in which he and André would work together onscreen.
Amy Irving later stated, "The role was difficult for me. It's not my forte to do comedy. You feel so exposed when you first try to do it, afraid that you'll appear ridiculous." [4]
Filming began in April 1984. [5] A month of shooting was left to do when Edwards fell ill with mononucleosis. Lou Antonio was brought in to complete the film and was credited as an Executive Producer. Nonetheless, the film came $1.6 million under budget. [6]
Micki and Maude premiered on December 2, 1984 at Cinema III in New York City. [7] [8]
"The last twenty minutes of “Micki + Maude,” as the two pregnant women move inexorably forward on their collision course, represents a kind of filmmaking that is as hard to do as anything you’ll ever see on a screen. The timing has to be flawless. So does the logic: One loose end, and the inevitability of a slapstick situation is undermined. Edwards and Moore are working at the top of their forms here, and the result is a pure, classic slapstick that makes “Micki + Maude” a real treasure." [9] — Roger Ebert
The film was a box office disappointment, although it grossed $26.2 million against a budget of $15.1 million. The critical reception was mixed to positive. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 70% based on 10 reviews, with an average score of 5.60/10. [10] [11] On Metacritic, the film received a score of 64 based on 11 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". [12]
In 1985, Moore won the Golden Globe award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical. [13] The film was also Golden Globe-nominated for Best Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical.
Micki and Maude was released on VHS in 1985 and 1989 by RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video and re-released in 1993 by Columbia TriStar Home Video. The DVD was released on November 3, 2003 by Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment.
Dudley Stuart John Moore CBE was an English actor, comedian, musician and composer. He first came to prominence in the UK as a leading figure in the British satire boom of the 1960s. He was one of the four writer-performers in the comedy revue Beyond the Fringe from 1960 that created a boom in satirical comedy. With a member of that team, Peter Cook, Moore collaborated on the BBC television series Not Only... But Also. In their popular double act, Moore's buffoonery contrasted with Cook's deadpan monologues. They jointly received the 1966 British Academy Television Award for Best Entertainment Performance and worked together on other projects until the mid-1970s, by which time Moore had settled in Los Angeles, California, to concentrate on his film acting.
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Crossing Delancey is a 1988 American romantic comedy film adapted by Susan Sandler from her play of the same name, and directed by Joan Micklin Silver. It stars Amy Irving and Peter Riegert. The film also features performances from Reizl Bozyk, David Hyde-Pierce, Sylvia Miles and Rosemary Harris. Amy Irving was nominated for a Golden Globe for the film, for Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical.
Ann Reinking was an American dancer, actress, choreographer, and singer. She worked predominantly in musical theater, starring in Broadway productions such as Coco (1969), Over Here! (1974), Goodtime Charley (1975), Chicago (1977), Dancin' (1978), and Sweet Charity (1986).
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Jonathan Reynolds was an American writer. He practiced as an actor for a short period before becoming a writer. He wrote for David Frost and Dick Cavett before a breakthrough with two comedy plays which ran off-Broadway in 1975. His most successful play was Geniuses at Playwrights Horizons in 1982, which was inspired by his time on the set of the war movie Apocalypse Now. Reynolds wrote several screenplays, receiving praise for his writing on the 1984 romantic comedy Micki & Maude. His other film work was less well received and he was awarded the 1988 Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Screenplay for 1987's Leonard Part 6. Reynolds returned to writing plays in the late 1990s and received a Pulitzer Prize for Drama nomination for his work on the 1997 play Stonewall Jackson's House. He wrote a food column for The New York Times Magazine between 2000 and 2005, publishing a selection of columns in book form in 2006. Reynolds returned to acting in 2003 leading in Dinner with Demons at the Second Stage Theater.
Dudley Moore, Ann Reinking, and Amy Irving attend the premiere of "Micki and Maude" on December 2, 1984 at Cinema III in New York City