Lenny Summary
MPAA Rating: R
Director: Bob Fosse
Genres: Drama
Rating:
Adapted by Julian_Barry from his own Broadway play, Lenny manages to be both brutally frank and highly romanticized in detailing the short life and career of influential, controversial stand-up comedian Lenny_Bruce. The chronology hops, skips and jumps between Lenny (Dustin_Hoffman) in his prime and the burned-out, strung-out performer who, in the twilight of his life, used his nightclub act to pour out his personal frustrations at great, boring length. We watch as up-and-coming comic Bruce courts his "Shiksa goddess," a stripper named Honey (Valerie_Perrine). With family responsibilities, Lenny is encouraged to do a "safe," conformist act, but he can't do it. Constantly in trouble for flouting obscenity laws, Lenny develops a near-messianic complex, which fuels both his comedy genius and his talent for self-destruction. Worn out by a lifetime of tilting at Establishment windmills, Lenny_Bruce died of a drug overdose in 1966. Director Bob_Fosse chose to film Lenny in black-and-white, giving the film the texture of a documentary. Though a film as verbally graphic as Lenny could not have been made when the real Lenny_Bruce was alive, audiences in 1974 responded, to the tune of an 11 million gross. Hal Erickson, Rovi
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