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Chance has greater ambitions than simply living off of Del Lago. He wants her to sign him to a movie contact, along with his estranged girlfriend Heavenly (Shirley Knight). Heavenly is the daughter of political boss Ed Begley, a cigar-chomping, hot-tempered, abusive monster whose immediate antecedent is the blowhard businessman from Born Yesterday. Begley has a son, Rip Torn, who is even worse: a sadistic anarchist whose best friend is a cane he uses for a prop.
Since it is a Paul Newman movie, we know how things will work out. The bad guys, Begley and Torn, will be humiliated. Heavenly, a blonde stand-in for Joanne Woodward, will end up with our flawed hero, Newman. And Page will pull herself together, as will Begley's golddigging mistress, Madeleine Sherwood.
How others will see it. The primary audience is classic movie lovers, eager to see Newman in his prime, and Page within striking distance of her prime. The cast is the draw. Time has lessened the appeal and shock value of the vulgar characters and story. Now, they might as well have been lifted from a condensed season of "Dallas."
How I felt about it. Scholars have only one question worthy of debate: Which character is the most outrageous? Is it Boss Finley, a completely unredeeming Huey Long caricature who gives speeches like a populist but is a raging control freak in private. Is it his son, Rip Torn, so eager to do his daddy's dirty work that daddy sometimes has to hold him back. Is it Madeleine Sherwood, the stereotype of feminine avarice and phony Southern charm. Is it Geraldine Page, whose personality wildly changes from one scene to the next.
My money is on Page. First, she is a barely functional lush. Then, she is a woman of the world, so cynical and hardened that she can laugh at Newman's crude attempt to blackmail her. Then she's a lush again. Still later, she begs Newman a la Sunset Blvd. to forget Heavenly and love her instead. Then she wants to leave Newman behind, and then she wants him to become her Hollywood boy toy. Will the real Alexandra Del Lago please stand up?
Newman is the star here, and we are supposed to feel sympathy for him. Despite the fact he is extorting from a woman, and enabling her alcoholism. We are supposed to forgive him for his sleazy actions, because of his motive. He's doing it all for Heavenly, his one true love, despite all the other women he's slept with. Never mind that Heavenly wants him to go away, if only for his own good. If anyone should go away, it's Heavenly. With a father and a brother like these, who needs enemies?
The characters are difficult enough to accept. But would Ed Begley's big political rally really take place right outside Paul Newman's balcony? Would Heavenly really evade her keeper and steal a speedboat for a private meeting with Newman, just to tell him to go away? Why doesn't Begley move Newman agent Aunt Nonnie (Mildred Dunnock) into a distant apartment? And why does young and able-bodied Rip Torn carry a cane like he's a malicious Mr. Peanut?