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...beginning, but not the end. "He was desperate to have this film work," his wife recalls. "He was like a string that would snap if it were pulled any tighter." Director Hal Ashby, knowing how much he needed assurances, tried to provide them, but in the midst of production could not always summon enough time or energy. Worse, Sellers found the principal location, the Biltmore mansion in Asheville, N.C., cold and depressing in the winter. As usual, he found it impossible to leave his role on the set and walked around inside Chance's deadly placid character all the time...
...Kramer vs. Kramer is advertised as a film that is "absolutely today." Nouns continue to be overrun by the jargonaut: the New York Times demands stronger sourcing, meetings are preambled, situations are impacted. The New York Post recently managed a dazzling double play with its offering: "Stunt man extraordinaire Hal Needham will helm the film, which will also (hopefully) include Roger Moore...
BEING THERE Directed by Hal Ashby Screenplay by Jerzy Kosinski...
Being There is a spectacular balancing act. For almost two hours, Writer Jerzy Kosinski, Director Hal Ashby and Star Peter Sellers keep a single, scorchingly witty joke floating miraculously through midair. Though the joke ultimately crashes to earth too early-about 15 minutes before the movie ends-the final letdown does not spoil what has gone before. Here is a comedy that valiantly defies both gravity and the latest Hollywood fashion. There isn't a single laugh in Being There that owes anything to Animal House...
Colored dots also fill the screen as the final credits roll for Being There, for which director Hal Ashby has coaxed terrific performances from Peter Sellers and Shirley MacLaine. These dots are tiny in contrast to those on the "filler" reel before Electric; they form the image of a gigantic color TV on the blink. This spectrum of static, infuriating when it appears on the 19-inch Sony in the den, seems almost beautiful, an electric Jackson Pollock or Gene Davis gone haywire on this enormous cinema canvas. The Being There audience stays until the last credit has disappeared over...