Jason Robards, Jr. plays the lead role of the unique, quirky, firmly unemployed Murray Burns and effortlessly masters the clever dialogue the way it was meant to be performed. Writer, Herb Gardner, created a delightful character like those you yourself rarely meet who have an uncommon outlook on life.
This movie caught my attention and prompted me to check out the screenplay from the library so I could experience the dialogue again and again.
There are so many one-liners and passages to admire, and you'll enjoy the charming performance on ukuleles of "Yes, Sir, That's My Baby" by Robards and Barry Gordon which is played against the background of Murray and Sandra exploring New York.
The sad thing about discovering a gem like this play for the first time is knowing that you won't experience that same pique of excitement and discovery again the second time through it again. But you do continue to marvel at the mind that can create such a fresh screenplay.
Unfortunately, I could not find much more information about the author, Herb Gardner, than what was on the cover jacket of the screenplay: He was born in Brooklyn and worked as a teen-ager selling orange-juice and checking coats at the Cort and National Theatres. "He saw some plays as many as 140 times and reports that that's an excellent way to learn the craft of the dramatist." He was also married to actress Rita Gardner.
Some favorite quotes:
"If most things aren't funny, Arn, then they're only exactly what they are; then it's one long dental appointment interrupted occasionally by something exciting, like waiting or falling asleep. What's the point if I leave everything exactly the way I find it? Then I'm just adding to the noise, then I'm just taking up some more room on the subway."
". . . it could have been any day, Arnie. . . sitting in the train going through any day. . . in the dark through any year. ... Arnie, it scared the hell out of me. You got to know what day it is. You got to know what's the name of the game and what the rules are with nobody else telling you. You have to own your days and name them, each one of them, every one of them, or else the years go right by and none of them belong to you. . . And that aint' just for weekends, kiddo. . . ."
