They All Laughed
Encyclopedia
For the 1937 song by George and Ira Gershwin see They All Laughed (song)
They All Laughed is a 1981 film
directed by Peter Bogdanovich
. It is based on a screenplay by Bogdanovich and Blaine Novak.
and tells the story of three private detectives investigating two beautiful women for infidelity. The detectives eventually wind up romantically pursuing the women, who turn the tables on them. They All Laughed is an updating of La Ronde, both in tone and theme. Detective John Russo (Ben Gazzara
) attempts to cheat on his girlfriend, country singer Christy Miller (Colleen Camp
), with a blonde taxi driver (Patti Hansen
), with the connivance of his colleague Arthur Brodsky (Blaine Novak). He has met the taxi driver en route from a meeting in which he's been assigned to follow Angela Niotes (Audrey Hepburn
), wife of a European tycoon. Detective Charles Rutledge (John Ritter
) falls in love with Dolores Martin (Dorothy Stratten
), whose husband has also hired him to spy on her. Rutledge is cautioned against this infatuation by his buddy Arthur. Feeling slighted by Russo's infidelity, Christy Miller throws herself at Rutledge but she ultimately falls in love with Dolores Martin's extramarital paramour Jose (Sean Ferrer). Russo's pursuit of Angela leads him to fall in love with her.
Indeed, the theme of secret love surfacing is pervasive throughout. Even Russo's relationship with the taxi driver—possibly the least secretive and most above-board of all the couplings, so much so that Russo is brought to confess that he is aging and his sexual prowess is failing—takes place under a pseudonym (Russo calls Deborah "Sam" for obscure reasons). The theme of hidden desires is echoed in the soundtrack, which juxtaposes country music by Roy Acuff
, Johnny Cash
, Waylon Jennings
, and Rodney Crowell
-- as well as by Camp—with visuals of the Manhattan skyline (the credits sequence follows a trek into Manhattan
, notably focusing on the twin towers of the World Trade Center
as Dorothy Stratten's credit appears) and songs by Frank Sinatra, including the eponymous hit.
played a lead role (she would later star in a made-for-TV film entitled Love Among Thieves
and later play a cameo role in Always). According to an interview conducted by Wes Anderson
in the DVD features for the film, director Peter Bogdanovich
claims Hepburn and Ben Gazzara
fell in love and had an affair while shooting Bloodline (1979)
. Though the affair was short-lived, it inspired the characters they would each play in They All Laughed.
Along with Heaven's Gate
, Cruising
, and One from the Heart
, They All Laughed is generally regarded as the end of the New Hollywood
period, and the director-driven studio films of the 1970s. Since the very public failures of these four films, Hollywood studios have never again allowed directors to control the films that they finance.
In recent years the film has experienced a level of positive reappraisal, with the likes of Quentin Tarantino
and Wes Anderson
now praising the film. The movie was released to VHS on January 31, 1995; HBO Home Video released the film to DVD (as a 25th Anniversary Edition) on October 17, 2006.
They All Laughed (song)
"They All Laughed" is a song composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, written for the 1937 film Shall We Dance where it was introduced by Ginger Rogers as part of a song and dance routine with Fred Astaire.-Notable recordings:...
They All Laughed is a 1981 film
1981 in film
-Events:*January 19 - Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer acquires beleaguered concurrent United Artists. UA was humiliated by the astronomical losses on the $40,000,000 movie Heaven's Gate, a major factor in the decision of owner Transamerica to sell it....
directed by Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich is an American film historian, director, writer, actor, producer, and critic. He was part of the wave of "New Hollywood" directors, which included William Friedkin, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Michael Cimino, and Francis Ford Coppola...
. It is based on a screenplay by Bogdanovich and Blaine Novak.
Plot
A romantic comedy, They All Laughed is set in New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and tells the story of three private detectives investigating two beautiful women for infidelity. The detectives eventually wind up romantically pursuing the women, who turn the tables on them. They All Laughed is an updating of La Ronde, both in tone and theme. Detective John Russo (Ben Gazzara
Ben Gazzara
-Early life:Gazzara was born Biagio Anthony Gazzara in New York City, the son of Italian immigrants Angelina and Antonio Gazzara, who was a laborer and carpenter. Gazzara grew up on New York's tough Lower East Side. He actually lived on E. 29th Street and participated in the drama program at...
) attempts to cheat on his girlfriend, country singer Christy Miller (Colleen Camp
Colleen Camp
Colleen Celeste Camp is an American actress and film producer, known for her performances in two installments of the Police Academy series and as Yvette the Maid in the 1985 black comedy Clue. She was also the first actress to play Kristin Shepard in U.S. prime time soap opera Dallas in 1979.Camp...
), with a blonde taxi driver (Patti Hansen
Patti Hansen
Patricia "Patti" Elvina Hansen is an American model and actress.-Early life and career:Hansen, who is of Norwegian ancestry, was born and raised in the Tottenville section of Staten Island, New York. The youngest of six children, Hansen was discovered by photographer Peter Gert at age 14...
), with the connivance of his colleague Arthur Brodsky (Blaine Novak). He has met the taxi driver en route from a meeting in which he's been assigned to follow Angela Niotes (Audrey Hepburn
Audrey Hepburn
Audrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian. Although modest about her acting ability, Hepburn remains one of the world's most famous actresses of all time, remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century...
), wife of a European tycoon. Detective Charles Rutledge (John Ritter
John Ritter
Jonathan Southworth "John" Ritter was an American actor, voice over artist and comedian perhaps best known for having played Jack Tripper and Paul Hennessy in the ABC sitcoms Three's Company and 8 Simple Rules, respectively...
) falls in love with Dolores Martin (Dorothy Stratten
Dorothy Stratten
Dorothy Stratten was a Canadian model and actress. Stratten was the Playboy Playmate of the Month for August 1979, Playmate of the Year in 1980 and was the second Playmate born in the 1960s. Stratten appeared in three comedy films and at least two episodes of shows broadcast on US network...
), whose husband has also hired him to spy on her. Rutledge is cautioned against this infatuation by his buddy Arthur. Feeling slighted by Russo's infidelity, Christy Miller throws herself at Rutledge but she ultimately falls in love with Dolores Martin's extramarital paramour Jose (Sean Ferrer). Russo's pursuit of Angela leads him to fall in love with her.
Themes
There are many hints at a relationship between the plot and real life in this picture, which has caused some commentators to question the discipline of the filmmakers but may, in time, actually contribute to the film's interest. Audrey Hepburn's son plays the part of Jose, though the part of her son in the film is played by Glenn Scarpelli. According to Bogdanovich, Hepburn and Gazzara had had an affair prior to the filming, though evidently this had fizzled out by the time filming began, and Gazzara's ongoing divorce made further contact inadvisable. (Commentators have not agreed as to whether Gazzara and Hepburn have good onscreen chemistry in They All Laughed). Bogdanovich's real-life daughters portray John Russo's daughters, who along with Arthur (pretending to be Russo's son in a crucial scene) are enlisted to win Angela Niotes's trust. More implicitly, Arthur, who acts primarily as a facilitator to the others' romances, is portrayed by one of the film's screenwriters. Charles, who pursues Dorothy Stratten's character, wears director Peter Bogdanovich's trademark oversized plastic-framed eyeglasses, perhaps a reference to Bogdanovich's initial guilt and subsequent acceptance of his love for Stratten.Indeed, the theme of secret love surfacing is pervasive throughout. Even Russo's relationship with the taxi driver—possibly the least secretive and most above-board of all the couplings, so much so that Russo is brought to confess that he is aging and his sexual prowess is failing—takes place under a pseudonym (Russo calls Deborah "Sam" for obscure reasons). The theme of hidden desires is echoed in the soundtrack, which juxtaposes country music by Roy Acuff
Roy Acuff
Roy Claxton Acuff was an American country music singer, fiddler, and promoter. Known as the King of Country Music, Acuff is often credited with moving the genre from its early string band and "hoedown" format to the star singer-based format that helped make it internationally successful.Acuff...
, Johnny Cash
Johnny Cash
John R. "Johnny" Cash was an American singer-songwriter, actor, and author, who has been called one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century...
, Waylon Jennings
Waylon Jennings
Waylon Arnold Jennings was an American country music singer, songwriter, and musician. Jennings began playing at eight. He began performing at twelve, on KVOW radio. Jennings formed a band The Texas Longhorns. Jennings worked as a D.J on KVOW, KDAV and KLLL...
, and Rodney Crowell
Rodney Crowell
Rodney Crowell is a Grammy Award-winning musician, known primarily for his work as a singer and songwriter in country music....
-- as well as by Camp—with visuals of the Manhattan skyline (the credits sequence follows a trek into 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...
, notably focusing on the twin towers of the World Trade Center
World Trade Center
The original World Trade Center was a complex with seven buildings featuring landmark twin towers in Lower Manhattan, New York City, United States. The complex opened on April 4, 1973, and was destroyed in 2001 during the September 11 attacks. The site is currently being rebuilt with five new...
as Dorothy Stratten's credit appears) and songs by Frank Sinatra, including the eponymous hit.
Significance
They All Laughed was the last theatrical film in which Audrey HepburnAudrey Hepburn
Audrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian. Although modest about her acting ability, Hepburn remains one of the world's most famous actresses of all time, remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century...
played a lead role (she would later star in a made-for-TV film entitled Love Among Thieves
Love Among Thieves
Love Among Thieves is a made-for-television romantic-adventure motion picture that was produced by the ABC network in 1987.The film starred Audrey Hepburn as the Baroness and concert pianist Caroline DuLac, who steals three jewel-encrusted Fabergé eggs from a San Francisco museum. The eggs were...
and later play a cameo role in Always). According to an interview conducted by Wes Anderson
Wes Anderson
Wesley Wales Anderson is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and producer of features, short films and commercials....
in the DVD features for the film, director Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich
Peter Bogdanovich is an American film historian, director, writer, actor, producer, and critic. He was part of the wave of "New Hollywood" directors, which included William Friedkin, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, Martin Scorsese, Michael Cimino, and Francis Ford Coppola...
claims Hepburn and Ben Gazzara
Ben Gazzara
-Early life:Gazzara was born Biagio Anthony Gazzara in New York City, the son of Italian immigrants Angelina and Antonio Gazzara, who was a laborer and carpenter. Gazzara grew up on New York's tough Lower East Side. He actually lived on E. 29th Street and participated in the drama program at...
fell in love and had an affair while shooting Bloodline (1979)
1979 in film
The year 1979 in film involved some significant events.- Major events :* March 5 - Production begins on Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.* May 25 - Alien, a landmark of the science fiction genre, is released....
. Though the affair was short-lived, it inspired the characters they would each play in They All Laughed.
Along with Heaven's Gate
Heaven's Gate (film)
Heaven's Gate is a 1980 American epic Western film based on the Johnson County War, a dispute between land barons and European immigrants in Wyoming in the 1890s...
, Cruising
Cruising (film)
Cruising is a 1980 film directed by William Friedkin and starring Al Pacino. The film is loosely based on the novel of the same name, by New York Times reporter Gerald Walker, about a serial killer targeting gay men, in particular those associated with the S&M scene.Poorly reviewed by critics,...
, and One from the Heart
One from the Heart
One from the Heart is a 1982 musical film directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The characters themselves do not actually sing but the powerful score dominates the movie. It is set entirely in Las Vegas, on the Las Vegas Strip and the desert surrounding the city...
, They All Laughed is generally regarded as the end of the New Hollywood
New Hollywood
New Hollywood or post-classical Hollywood, sometimes referred to as the "American New Wave", refers to the time from roughly the late-1960s to the early 1980s when a new generation of young filmmakers came to prominence in America, influencing the types of films produced, their production and...
period, and the director-driven studio films of the 1970s. Since the very public failures of these four films, Hollywood studios have never again allowed directors to control the films that they finance.
In recent years the film has experienced a level of positive reappraisal, with the likes of Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...
and Wes Anderson
Wes Anderson
Wesley Wales Anderson is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and producer of features, short films and commercials....
now praising the film. The movie was released to VHS on January 31, 1995; HBO Home Video released the film to DVD (as a 25th Anniversary Edition) on October 17, 2006.
Cast
- Audrey HepburnAudrey HepburnAudrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian. Although modest about her acting ability, Hepburn remains one of the world's most famous actresses of all time, remembered as a film and fashion icon of the twentieth century...
.... Angela Niotes - Ben GazzaraBen Gazzara-Early life:Gazzara was born Biagio Anthony Gazzara in New York City, the son of Italian immigrants Angelina and Antonio Gazzara, who was a laborer and carpenter. Gazzara grew up on New York's tough Lower East Side. He actually lived on E. 29th Street and participated in the drama program at...
.... John Russo - Patti HansenPatti HansenPatricia "Patti" Elvina Hansen is an American model and actress.-Early life and career:Hansen, who is of Norwegian ancestry, was born and raised in the Tottenville section of Staten Island, New York. The youngest of six children, Hansen was discovered by photographer Peter Gert at age 14...
.... Sam (Deborah Wilson) - John RitterJohn RitterJonathan Southworth "John" Ritter was an American actor, voice over artist and comedian perhaps best known for having played Jack Tripper and Paul Hennessy in the ABC sitcoms Three's Company and 8 Simple Rules, respectively...
.... Charles Rutledge - Dorothy StrattenDorothy StrattenDorothy Stratten was a Canadian model and actress. Stratten was the Playboy Playmate of the Month for August 1979, Playmate of the Year in 1980 and was the second Playmate born in the 1960s. Stratten appeared in three comedy films and at least two episodes of shows broadcast on US network...
.... Dolores Martin - Blaine Novak .... Arthur Brodsky
- Linda MacEwen .... Amy Lester
- George MorfogenGeorge MorfogenGeorge Morfogen is an American actor. He is known for playing Bob Rebadow in the HBO show Oz, and for his role as Stanley Bernstein in the original V miniseries....
.... Leon Leondopolous - Colleen CampColleen CampColleen Celeste Camp is an American actress and film producer, known for her performances in two installments of the Police Academy series and as Yvette the Maid in the 1985 black comedy Clue. She was also the first actress to play Kristin Shepard in U.S. prime time soap opera Dallas in 1979.Camp...
.... Christy Miller - Sean H. Ferrer .... Jose