Just Tell Me What You Want is a 1980 American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 comedy film

Comedy film

Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...

 directed by Sidney Lumet

Sidney Lumet

Sidney Lumet was an American director, producer and screenwriter with over 50 films to his credit. He was nominated for the Academy Award as Best Director for 12 Angry Men , Dog Day Afternoon , Network and The Verdict...

. It stars Ali MacGraw

Ali MacGraw

Elizabeth Alice "Ali" MacGraw is an American actress. She is known for her role in Love Story, for which she won a Golden Globe and received an Academy Award nomination.-Early life:...

, Peter Weller

Peter Weller

Peter Frederick Weller is an American film and stage actor, director and lecturer.He is best known for his roles as the title character in the first two RoboCop films and Buckaroo Banzai in the cult classic The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension...

 and Alan King, and was also the final film of screen legend Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy was an American actress. Trained as a dancer, she devoted herself fully to an acting career following a few minor roles in silent films. Originally typecast in exotic roles, often as a vamp or a woman of Asian descent, her career prospects improved following her portrayal of Nora Charles...

.

The screenplay by Jay Presson Allen

Jay Presson Allen

Jay Presson Allen was an American screenwriter, playwright, stage director, television producer and novelist. Known for her withering wit and sometimes-off-color wisecracks, she was one of the few women making a living as a screenwriter at a time when women were a rarity in the profession...

, adapted from her novel, won her the David di Donatello Award

David di Donatello

David di Donatello, named after Donatello's David, is a movie award assigned each year for cinematic performances and production by Ente David di Donatello, part of Accademia del Cinema Italiano. It is the Italian equivalent to the Academy Award. There are 24 categories as of 2006.- History :The...

 for Best Screenplay of a Foreign Film.

Plot

Max Herschel, the married, wealthy, vulgar, egotistical

Egotism

Egotism is "characterized by an exaggerated estimate of one's intellect, ability, importance, appearance, wit, or other valued personal characteristics" – the drive to maintain and enhance favorable views of oneself....

, middle-aged head of a corporate empire, is satisfied with the somewhat casual love/hate relationship he shares with his mistress and protegee, television producer

Television producer

The primary role of a television Producer is to allow all aspects of video production, ranging from show idea development and cast hiring to shoot supervision and fact-checking...

 Bones Burton, just as it is, but she wants a more serious commitment.

The young woman attempts to extricate herself from the affair -- or perhaps force her lover into taking the next, more permanent step -- by dating an even younger man, off-off-Broadway playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

 Steven Routledge. Max, however, is not a man to accept defeat in any of his endeavors, and he retaliates with a vengeance. The two engage in an escalating battle of wits, with Max discovering money can't resolve everything when he is outsmarted by business rival Seymour Berger and his grandson Mike.

Production

The film features the last motion picture performance of Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy

Myrna Loy was an American actress. Trained as a dancer, she devoted herself fully to an acting career following a few minor roles in silent films. Originally typecast in exotic roles, often as a vamp or a woman of Asian descent, her career prospects improved following her portrayal of Nora Charles...

, who plays Herschel's confidential secretary.

Interiors of the Warner Bros.

Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

 release were filmed at the Kaufman Astoria Studios

Kaufman Astoria Studios

The Kaufman Astoria Studios is an historic movie studio located in the Astoria section of the New York City borough of Queens.-History:It was originally built by Famous Players-Lasky in 1920 to provide the company with a facility close to the Broadway theater district. Many features and short...

 in Queens, New York, with Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

 exteriors (and the opening scene in Bergdorf Goodman

Bergdorf Goodman

Bergdorf Goodman is a luxury goods department store based on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. The company was founded in 1899 by Herman Bergdorf and was later owned and managed by Edwin Goodman, and later his son Andrew Goodman....

) shot on location.

Principal cast

• Alan King
  Alan King (comedian)
  Alan King was an American actor and comedian known for his biting wit and often angry humorous rants. King became well known as a Jewish comedian and satirist. He was also a serious actor who appeared in a number of movies and television shows. King wrote several books, produced films, and...
  
   ..... Max Herschel
• Ali MacGraw
  Ali MacGraw
  Elizabeth Alice "Ali" MacGraw is an American actress. She is known for her role in Love Story, for which she won a Golden Globe and received an Academy Award nomination.-Early life:...
  
   ..... Bones Burton
• Peter Weller
  Peter Weller
  Peter Frederick Weller is an American film and stage actor, director and lecturer.He is best known for his roles as the title character in the first two RoboCop films and Buckaroo Banzai in the cult classic The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension...
  
   ..... Steven Routledge
• Keenan Wynn
  Keenan Wynn
  Keenan Wynn was an American character actor. His bristling mustache and expressive face were his stock in trade, and though he rarely had a lead role, he got prominent billing in most of his film and TV parts....
  
   ..... Seymour Berger
• Tony Roberts
  Tony Roberts (actor)
  David Anthony "Tony" Roberts is an American actor. He is best known for his roles in several Woody Allen movies, usually cast as Allen's best friend.-Early life:...
  
   ..... Mike Berger
• Myrna Loy
  Myrna Loy
  Myrna Loy was an American actress. Trained as a dancer, she devoted herself fully to an acting career following a few minor roles in silent films. Originally typecast in exotic roles, often as a vamp or a woman of Asian descent, her career prospects improved following her portrayal of Nora Charles...
  
   ..... Stella Liberti
• Dina Merrill
  Dina Merrill
  -Early life:Merrill was born Nedenia Marjorie Hutton in New York City, New York, the only child of Post Cereals heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and her second husband, Wall Street stockbroker Edward Francis Hutton...
  
   ..... Connie Herschel
• Judy Kaye
  Judy Kaye
  Judy Kaye is an American singer and actress. She has appeared in stage musicals, plays, and operas. Kaye has been in long runs on Broadway in the musicals The Phantom of the Opera, Ragtime and Mamma Mia!-Biography:...
  
   ..... Baby
• Joseph Maher
  Joseph Maher
  Joseph Maher was an Irish character actor who appeared in 43 films and was nominated for three Tony Awards and a Drama Desk Award for his supporting roles on the stage.-Career:...
  
   ..... Dr. Coleson

Principal production credits

• Original Music
  Film score
  A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
  
   ..... Charles Strouse
  Charles Strouse
  Charles Strouse is an American composer and lyricist.-Life and career:Strouse was born and raised in New York City, the son of Ira and Ethel Strouse...
  
  
• Cinematography
  Cinematography
  Cinematography is the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for cinema. It is closely related to the art of still photography...
  
   ..... Oswald Morris
  Oswald Morris
  Oswald Norman Morris OBE, DFC, AFC, BSC is a British cinematographer. Known to his colleagues by the nicknames "Os" or "Ossie", Morris' film cinematography career spanned six decades.-Early life and career:...
  
  
• Production Design
  Production designer
  In film and television, a production designer is the person responsible for the overall look of a filmed event such as films, TV programs, music videos or adverts. Production designers have one of the key creative roles in the creation of motion pictures and television. Working directly with the...
  
   ..... Tony Walton
  Tony Walton
  Tony Walton is an English set and costume designer.Walton was born in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England, United Kingdom. He began his career in 1957 with the stage design for Noel Coward's Broadway production of Conversation Piece. Throughout the late 1950s and early 1960s he designed for the New...
  
  
• Art Direction ..... John Jay Moore
• Set Decoration ..... Robert Drumheller, Justin Scoppa, Jr.
• Costume Design
  Costume design
  Costume design is the fabrication of apparel for the overall appearance of a character or performer. This usually involves researching, designing and building the actual items from conception. Costumes may be for a theater or cinema performance but may not be limited to such...
  
   ..... Gloria Gresham, Tony Walton

Critical reception

In his review in Time

Time (magazine)

Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...

, Frank Rich

Frank Rich

Frank Rich is an American essayist and op-ed columnist who wrote for The New York Times from 1980, when he was appointed its chief theatre critic, until 2011...

 stated, "After a brisk 20 minutes, the movie loses its assurance and sense of purpose. Indeed, Jay Presson Allen's screenplay reels around like a drunken sailor. From moment to moment, Just Tell Me is a somber and confusingly plotted story of corporate power struggles, a syrupy account of a love triangle, and a sloppy satire of show business . . . There are still some bright moments, but they are separated by flaccid, poorly connected scenes that go nowhere at great length. The few high points belong to King and MacGraw. [He] is too much of a pussycat to convey the hero's toughness, but he delivers Allen's best sallies with crackling speed . . . Though MacGraw is no comedian

Comedian

A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...

, she is animated and playful for the first time in memory."