Movers & Shakers
| Movers & Shakers | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | William Asher |
| Produced by |
William Asher Charles Grodin |
| Written by | Charles Grodin |
| Starring |
Walter Matthau Charles Grodin Vincent Gardenia Tyne Daly Bill Macy Gilda Radner |
| Music by |
Ken Welch Mitzie Welch |
| Cinematography | Robbie Greenberg |
| Editing by | Tom Benko |
| Studio | United Artists |
| Distributed by | MGM/UA Entertainment Co. |
| Release dates | May 3, 1985 |
| Running time | 80m |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Box office | $372,438 |
Movers & Shakers is a 1985 comedy movie distributed by MGM. It stars Walter Matthau and was directed by William Asher.
The story follows the head of production at a Hollywood studio who wants to make a movie to fulfill a promise made to a dying friend.
The film was written by Charles Grodin, who also appears in the movie. The cast includes Tyne Daly, Gilda Radner, and Vincent Gardenia. Steve Martin makes a cameo appearance as Fabio Longio.
Plot
Hollywood studio mogul Joe Mulholland (Matthau) vows to produce the pet project of a dying acquaintance, who has been trying to find a way to make a film out of a best-selling sex manual. He and screenwriter Herb Derman (Grodin) try to make it happen, but fail in every possible way. Meanwhile, Herb is distracted by his own marital problems.
Production
Charles Grodin recounts the making of the this film in is autobiography ‘It would be so nice If you weren’t here’:
In the mid Seventies, Paramount Pictures paid a great amount of money to secure the rights to Alex Comfort’s sex manual The Joy of Sex just so they could use the title, which they found to be highly commercial. In 1978 they hired Charles Grodin to write a script, telling him the movie ‘could be about anything’. Grodin decided to use this exact situation as the premise: a Hollywood writer struggles to write a script based on a sex manual after a big studio acquires the rights. When he finished his first draft, the studio passed and eventually released National Lampoon's Joy of Sex in 1984.
After Paramount put Grodin’s script in turnaround in 1978, he was free to offer it to other studios. However, since Paramount held the rights to the title ‘The Joy of Sex’, the film was retitled ‘Dreamers’. Columbia Pictures showed interest to produce it with Peter Falk playing the leading role of the producer. But when the deal with Columbia fell through, Charles Grodin ended up pitching his screenplay to every studio several times over the course of the next 7 years. Eventually director William Asher agreed to make it for two millions dollars if people would defer salaries. This is why Grodin and Asher share a producers credit on the finished film.
Grodin got some of his actors friends involved in trying to pitch the film. Himself, Steve Martin, Gilda Radner, Penny Marshall and Tyne Daly all agreed to work for the least amount of money the union allowed. Steve Martin did so without even reading the script. When the film was finally green-lit, Grodin received no salary for writing or producing the film, only the minimum for working five weeks as an actor: about five thousand dollars for two years of work (seven years in total since the inception of the project).
When the film was finally ready to go in front of the cameras, original lead actor Peter Falk was no longer available. Another well known comic actor had to drop out when he didn’t pass his insurance physical. Walter Matthau agreed to star at the very last minute, receiving $1 million, half his usual fee at the time for his work.
Following not very successful preview screenings, the son of MGM exec Greg Morrision suggested to add narration by Charles Grodin to the picture.
MGM initially refused to pay for the picture nor release it, because ‘it was not of first-class technical quality’ and ‘does not reflect the screenplay’. The film finally got a limited release in several large cities across America. However, because of its small budget ($3.5 million) and all star cast, it was sure to make money for MGM on video cassette, cable, regular television and foreign sales.
See also
Ode – a poem by Arthur O'Shaughnessy credited with popularising the phrase "movers & shakers".
External links
- Movers & Shakers at the Internet Movie Database
- Movers & Shakers at the TCM Movie Database
- Movers & Shakers at allmovie
| |||||