Opening Night

Opening Night by John Cassavetes (1977, 144 min.). Gena Rowlands stars as an aging alcoholic actress. In the days leading up to her latest Broadway opening, she's barely keeping herself together after a young fan is killed while running after her limousine. Hitting the bottle harder than ever, she blunders through her opening night performance. Joan Blondell costars as the sardonic but confident playwright, and longtime Cassavetes star Ben Gazarra is Rowlands's smiling but pitiless manager. Cassavetes has a small role as her co-star, who keeps to himself until forced to deal with her onstage in a finale that is either an inspired ad-lib or the loopiest climax to a Broadway drama ever written. (Peter Falk has a blink-and-you'll miss him cameo, but notable enough for the film to be included it in our Cassavetes-Falk retrospective.) "Woody Allen said he could watch a Bergman movie and feel himself gripped as if by a thriller; that's how I felt watching this restored version of Cassavetes's Opening Night" (Peter Bradshaw, Guardian UK).
Location: Remis Auditorium