David R. Schwartz Movies
- 1967
Peter Sellers stars, as the tagline states, "as that cunning matador who flees from the bulls so that he may chase the chicks!" Juan Bautista (Peter Sellers) is an inept matador who wants to be a singer. Francisco Carbonell (Adolfo Celi), the owner of a local Barcelona night spot, offers Juan a singing contract for a week --the only stipulation being that he has three days to seduce Olimpia Segura (Britt Ekland), the "most desirable woman in Barcelona." The bumbling matador tries a series of half-baked lovemaking techniques that, amazingly, get Olimpia to come around. But when Olimpia discovers that Juan wanted to seduce her merely to get a singing job, Juan finds that avoiding charging bulls is a much safer vocation than dealing with an irate Olimpia. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Peter Sellers, Britt Ekland, (more)
In this romantic comedy, an aspiring actress pays her bills by working as a maid for various households. One of her employers is a wealthy and prominent publisher. After accidentally running into each other a number of times on the New York streets without recognizing each other, they begin to fall in love. She wants to take him home, but she is ashamed of her humble quarters. Believing that the publisher is out of town, she decides to take the lover to that apartment and pretend that it is hers. The lover/ publisher did have a business trip, but it was canceled. He decides to go along with her ruse and pretends that he has never been in his own apartment before. The trouble is, he now has no home to go home to; instead, he begins bunking with his business partner. In the end, both would-be lovers learn the truth, but they still refuse to tell each other that they know. Things get a little crazy, especially when the maid has all her girl friends dress up as hookers and come for a wild party at his apartment. He has the last laugh when they end up in jail. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Sandra Dee, Bobby Darin, (more)
Helen Gurley Brown's self-help best-seller was the nominal source for this Hollywood sex romp, directed by Richard Quine, co-scripted by Joseph Heller and David R. Schwartz, and starring Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood. Tony Curtis plays Bob Weston, a writer for the scandal sheet "Dirt," who is working on an article on research psychologist Helen Gurley Brown (Natalie Wood) and her best-selling book Sex and the Single Girl. Bob needs to interview Helen, but she refuses to see him. Bob impersonates one of her neighbors, Frank Broderick (Henry Fonda), as a ruse in order to see her on the pretext of marital counseling. After several meetings, Bob attempts to seduce her; after they fall out of a boat and head back to Helen's apartment to dry out, Bob plies her with martinis. Rip-roarin' drunk, Helen confesses her love for Bob. He assures her it's fine, since he's not legally married, but Helen doesn't believe him and asks to meet his wife, Sylvia (Lauren Bacall). To fill up the breach, Bob mistakenly sends both his secretary, Susan (Leslie Parrish), and his ex-girlfriend Gretchen (Fran Jeffries) to see Helen -- both impersonating Sylvia. When the real Sylvia arrives at Helen's apartment with the two other women, Sylvia has her hapless husband Frank put in jail for bigamy. By this point, Helen has realized Bob's skullduggery and leaves town with her colleague Rudy DeMeyer (Mel Ferrer). Bob chases Helen onto the San Diego Freeway, where they also encounter Frank, who is being followed in a cab by Sylvia. A wild chase ensues as the bickering couples try to make it to their flights at the L.A. airport. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Tony Curtis, Natalie Wood, (more)
The Rat Pack packed it in after this sprightly musical comedy that owes more than it should to Damon Runyon's stories and Frank Loesser and Abe Burrows's classic musical Guys and Dolls. Sammy Cahn and Jimmy Van Heusen's bright and snappy score features such songs as "Style", "Bang-Bang" and the Sinatra standard "My Kind of Town". Set in 1920s Chicago, the tale begins during a birthday party for head mobster Big Jim (Edward G. Robinson) who is shot to death during the celebration. Rival gangster Guy Gisbourne (Peter Falk) immediately declares himself the chief gangster. The northside gang, headed by Robbo (Frank Sinatra) is willing to grant Guy his self-declared title as long as he leaves the northside territory alone. Guy refuses and when small time hood Little John (Dean Martin) joins Robbo's crew, turf warfare breaks out between the two gangs, resulting in the destruction of both Robbo and Guy's nightclubs. Meanwhile, Big Jim's daughter Marian (Barbara Rush) offers Robbo $50,000 to find the man who killed her father. Robbo demurs and gives the money to his henchman Will (Sammy Davis Jr.) to get rid of. Will, hoping to do a good deed, hands the money over to Allen A. Dale (Bing Crosby), who runs an orphanage. Allen, finding out that the money came from Robbo, informs the newspapers of Robbo's philanthropic enterprise and Robbo immediately becomes a local celebrity, referred to as Chicago's Robin Hood. For his part, Robbo is willing to go along with the publicity. On the romantic front, although Robbo is attracted to Marian, he gives her the brush-off when he finds she is using a charitable foundation as a front for a counterfeiting ring being run by herself and Little John. Robbo tells Marian to leave town. Instead, she hooks up with Guy, proposing that he kill both Robbo and Little John. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, (more)
- 1963
In this different type of gangster farce with a few flaws here and there, Robert Preston is Steve Blair, a superlative con artist whose sidekick Paul Ferris (Tony Randall) is a boozy writer currently working on a cartoon. Steve gets the idea of producing a movie based on Genesis in the Bible and brings Paul into the scheme as a scripter. He finds financial backing in the form of $2,000,000 from gangster Tony Dallas (Walter Matthau) who is none too happy when the final product flops with a resounding crash. Anxious to find a safe spot to hide out, Steve and Paul make their way to a Greek island where Steve is inspired by another brilliant idea for a scam that just might work, knowing full well that the gangster is sure to show up sooner or later. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Robert Preston, Tony Randall, (more)
