Elaine May Double Feature

After the breakup of her acclaimed comedy act with Mike Nichols, May, like her former partner, moved on to directing for stage and screen, her feature debut, marking the emergence of one of the great comic voices in American cinema. Layabout patrician playboy Henry, having exhausted his family fortune, finds a new one in the person of mousy heiress Henrietta, played by May herself. Matthau’s Graham is a sublimely snooty creation, while May is a riot as the stumblebum bluestocking who irritates him to the very brink of homicide.

(Elaine May, USA, English, 102min, 1971, DCP)