Frank Cucci Movies
Frank Cucci's best-known screenplay is Lily in Love (1985), a film produced by both the U.S. and Hungary. He also wrote plays and for television. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide- 1985
In this surprisingly amateurish production for noted Hungarian director Karoly Makk, Fitz (Christopher Plummer) is a well-known Broadway actor longing to get a leading role in a truly successful movie when his wife Lily (Maggie Smith) comes up with a sure-fire script. Too bad for Fitz, the male lead in Lily's script just has to be a blond Italian. Not one to be put off by minor details, Fitz dons a blond wig and an equally unconvincing Italian accent and lands the part. Soon the cast and crew are jetting off to Budapest, the filming location, where their parody of filmmakers may leave some viewers wondering if Lily in Love might have been successful as a parody itself. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Christopher Plummer, Maggie Smith, (more)
- 1984
84-year-old James Cagney delivered his final performance in the TV movie Terrible Joe Moran. Cagney plays a former boxing champ, now enfeebled and bound to a wheelchair (we see him in his prime via a clip from Cagney's 1932 vehicle Winner Take All). Long estranged from his family, the ex-boxer grudgingly allows his granddaughter (Ellen Barkin) to move in with him and his former trainer (beautifully played by Art Carney). The girl is unfortunately a compulsive thief, carrying on a romance with a petty crook with mob connections. The broken-hearted grandfather agrees to pay off the boy friend's debts so long as his granddaughter leaves and never returns. But Terrible Joe Moran and his chastened grandchild are tearfully reunited in the finale. Critics in 1984 went overboard praising the obviously ailing James Cagney for his bravura performance; only after his death did the truth come out that most of Cagney's dialogue had been dubbed in by an impressionist. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1972
An African American youth must deal with both many physical tests and the racism of his peers as he works to become a full-fledged fire fighter in this drama that was originally made as a television pilot. As he is the only black man in an all white unit, things are difficult, especially after he learns that the man he replaced was killed in a fire set by a black arsonist. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
