Taped this from a recent commercial-ridden broadcast recently and had the opportunity to compare it with the 20th-Century Fox film starring Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman, shown tonight on AMC (not letterboxed, darn it!) This TV film suffered from some rather prodigious miscasting, in my view, and certainly seemed tedious and drawn out, compared to Martin Ritt's brisk direction of the CinemaScope mounting. I felt that Judith Ivey and Jason Robards, Jr., especially, were unconvincing and Don Johnson's oily charm, or lack of it, made Paul Newman's turn as Ben Quick look like Olivier's finest hour. Only Cybill Shepherd was given the chance to approximate Lee Remick's verve and sass as Eula Varner. And why did they bother to say that Ava Gardner was a part of the cast? She seems to be seen only in a few long shots, or did they edit out her few scenes to make room for all those advertisers? A disappointment, compared to the theatrical film.
Review of The Long Hot Summer
