My Favorite Year (1982)

User Rating:

7.2/10   

Director:

Richard Benjamin

Writers:

Dennis Palumbo (screenplay)
Dennis Palumbo (story)

Release Date:

1 October 1982 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy

Plot:

A dissolute matinee idol is slated to appear on a live TV variety show.

Plot Keywords:

Womanizer | Live Television | 1950s | Television | Star

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 2 wins & 4 nominations

Cast

Peter O'Toole	...	Alan Swann
Mark Linn-Baker	...	Benjy Stone
Jessica Harper	...	K. C. Downing
Joseph Bologna	...	King Kaiser
Bill Macy	...	Sy Benson
Lainie Kazan	...	Belle Carroca
Anne De Salvo	...	Alice Miller
Basil Hoffman	...	Herb Lee
Lou Jacobi	...	Uncle Morty
Adolph Green	...	Leo Silver
Tony DiBenedetto	...	Alfi Bambacelli
George Wyner	...	Myron Fein
Selma Diamond	...	Lil
Cameron Mitchell	...	Karl Rojeck
Jenny Neumann	...	Connie

Also Known As:

My Favourite Year (UK)

Runtime:

92 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Metrocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:L | Australia:M | Finland:K-12 | Sweden:11 | UK:PG | USA:PG

Filming Locations:

Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA

Company:

Brooksfilms

Trivia:

Peter O'Toole talked the producers into paying for a fencing instructor to get him in shape for the fight sequence.

Goofs:

Anachronisms: The cameras in the Comedy Cavalcade studio are RCA TK-14s, which were not introduced until the late 1950s. (NBC would have used RCA TK-30, TK-10 or TK-11 cameras for black-and-white shows at this time.) In another scene a Marconi Mark IV camera is being pushed through a hallway; this camera also was not available until the late 1950s.

Quotes:

Uncle Morty: So, Mr. Swann, we've spent time, we've broken bread together. I feel I know you.
Swann: Morty, I feel I know you even better.
Uncle Morty: So you won't mind if I ask you a personal question.
Benjy Stone: Uncle Morty!
Uncle Morty: What's the matter, you think I was born in Minsk a Pinsk?
Swann: Morty, ask your question.
Uncle Morty: That paternity rap a few years ago - did you shtup her?

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Saturday Night Live: Joan Rivers/Musical Youth (#8.17)" (1983)

Soundtrack:

How High the Moon

A humane, funny film with a great heart.

I was born in 1958, so I never saw Your Show of Shows, and needless to say, I never knew there was a famous or infamous incident involving one of my boyhood idols, a very drunk Errol Flynn.Dennis Palumbo, in what is ( sadly) apparently his only effort as a script writer, has taken this incident and woven a very human and very funny film from it. Benjamin's direction is excellent, and Peter O'Toole ( playing, it must be said, a variant of himself), is wonderful, as is most of the rest of the cast. Benjamin shows a sure comic touch in his debut. In short, like Quiz Show, one of the best movies about the fifties, and one of the best movies about the early days of television.