I saw this film in its original run. I knew it was going to be something of a cringe but we went as sort of a goof just to see Lewis make an a#* out of himself. The film actually evoked sympathy from me. I couldn't believe how God awful it was...how any film crew, studio exec or preview audience could have allowed this thing to escape. It was far worse than Lucille Ball in her 70s doing slapstick, physical comedy in "Life With Lucy" or an alcoholic Lon Chaney Jr., oblivious that he was on live television, not in a dress rehearsal, gently picking up and setting down furniture he was supposed to be smashing in rage during a Halmark Hall of Fame Theater episode. Lewis was still something of a young man at 54, yes, years removed from his heyday and in the thick of painkiller addiction but still in possession of an active and creative mind. Who sat through the final edits of this and said "That's a wrap...nice job"? One scene that still sticks out in my mind 28 years later was the scene where Bo, employed as a waiter, gets his ring caught in the shawl of an elegant female customer. He immediately devolves into an imbecile and begins delivering his dialog in a lispy, slushy baby talk mumbling over and over again "My ring is caught in your mesh" as he's unable to untangle himself. I remember thinking, "This isn't funny...it's not even a flavor of bad I can enjoy and laugh at...it's just pitifully sad." Thank God Lewis found himself several years later in a perfectly suited non-lead role playing the iconic, self absorbed, "Carson-like SOB" talk show host in "The King of Comedy". He was fantastic playing a despicable narcissist.
Review of Hardly Working
