June Claman Movies
- 2001
This comedy centers on a struggling screenwriter, a down-on-his-luck actor, and a theater diva, whose lives all intertwine while trying to make it in Hollywood. John Duggan (John Rafter Lee) is a hapless playwright shopping around an IRA script that nobody wants, so he decides to dive headfirst into staging his Third Reich production entitled "Hitler's Head," which is speculated to have been funded with laundered drug money. His best pal, also named John (John Billingsley) is unable to land any acting work, moonlighting at a psychic hotline and as a chauffeur to theater diva Emma (June Claman), a job he eventually shares with Duggan. Emma, a spiteful, racist bigot, hears of John's play and decides she must have a role in it, but only if she is able to tailor the material to her advantage. Breathing Hard first screened at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival in the market territory.
~ Jason Clark, All Movie Guide
~ Jason Clark, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- John Rafter Lee, June Claman, (more)
Plagued by debts, New Yorkers Brad (Tim Allen) and Caroline (Kirstie Alley) Sexton continue to live the high life while maintaining the deception of wealth. But then real estate developer Brad learns his accountant has balanced the books in his own favor, appropriated $5 million, and flown to South America -- after first devising a set-up in which only Brad and Caroline would be blamed by the IRS. With IRS agent Derek Lester (Larry Miller) on their tail, the Sextons escape from New York. They arrive at the Amish community of Intercourse, Pennsylvania, where they pose as the Missouri relatives of farmer Samuel Yoder (Jay O. Sanders). It's the perfect hiding place, but it requires Brad and Caroline to suppress their previous sophisticated lifestyle, as they attempt to adopt Amish attitudes and customs. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tim Allen, Kirstie Alley, (more)
- 1993
Frasier learns to his dismay that a friend and fellow doctor has died of a sudden heart attack. It helps Frasier's peace of mind not at all that he and his late friend were exactly the same age. Hoping to come to grips with his own mortality -- and to avoid the dead man's fate -- Frasier attends his friend's "shiva" (a Jewish wake). This episode originally aired December 2, 1993, replacing a planned rebroadcast of Frasier's pilot episode. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Michael Ritchie's The Couch Trip follows a long line of Hollywood films (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, The Disorderly Orderly) in which the psychos are seen as saner than the psychiatrists. Charles Grodin plays Dr. George Maitlin, a pompous radio self-help guru, who is having his own personal mental breakdown. Maitlin's lawyer puts in a call to a Cicero, IL, mental facility and the telephone is answered by schizophrenic mental patient John Burns (Dan Aykroyd). Thinking Burns is a crony of Maitlin, Burns is offered the job of replacing Maitlin during his recovery. Of course, Burns accepts the job. Immediately jetted to Los Angeles, Burns meets panhandler Donald Becker (Walter Matthau) at the airport. While wearing the garb of a priest, Becker sounds off against the madness of societal conventions; Burns takes to him immediately and they become fast friends. When Burns assumes command of the airwaves in Maitlin's place, his words of wisdom are so obvious and commonsensical that he is an overnight sensation. Meanwhile, in London, where Maitlin is convalescing, he gets wind of Burns' success. With renewed vigor and outrage, Maitlin leaves his recovery room and hops on a plane back to Los Angeles in an effort to recover his radio show. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Dan Aykroyd, Walter Matthau, (more)
