Imagine you're part of the usual disfunctional New York family..... I want you to visualise Pamela, first; Pamela who wants to be known as Sigourney, the successful Yuppie stockbroker, (think of Meryl Streep for the part),with a staid, upright lover, Phillip, whom she finds as interesting as an `empty suit'. (could Jack Lemmon scrub up for this part, I wonder?) There's sister Sharon, the perpetually overweight neurotic ex-librarian, with two young children who should definitely be seen and not heard, (get Roseanne for this one), her husband-from-Hell, Barney, professionally unemployed, (this is yours, Jack Nicholson), and brother Bruce,a really nice guy just proudly Out-Of-The-Closet, and his current partner, Todd;(I'm signing up Mel Gibson and Tom Cruise for these two parts and they can toss for who gets whichever!)
Now this family exists and coexists with, probably, only one thing really in common...they are all, quite critically, for a variety of reasons, short of money! The family, of course, has a Family Conference worthy of the best Sit-Com......and decides that the only course, since noone can support Phyllis in the most expensive city in the United States, is to marry her off to a really rich man, who will then be able to support all of THEM. Phyllis is a bit dubious, since she's already met a nice man on the plane, but agrees, good mother that she is, to go along with the family wishes.
But Phyllis must be groomed for the part she is to play. Sigourney pays for the suite at the hotel- and the clothes and makeover Bruce and Todd orchestrate so efficiently, so charmingly and so successfully, while Sharon utilizes her research skills to come up with appropriate eligible bachelors and widowers who begin to infiltrate the cast.( In the process, parts are created for Walter Matthau, Robert Redford, Paul Newman and Phillip Rush!) . Things come unstuck a little when Mrs Katz appears, still clutching her handbag, to move into the hotel with Phyllis, and, limpet-style, to chaperone her to the chagrin of the allied family members. |
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