PiraBit
if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.
Kaelan Mccaffrey
Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.
Juana
what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.
evening1
I kept thinking of how the self-actualized Jane Fonda of today must look back on this trifle and blush. She plays Ellen, a ditsy bimbo with no discernible direction in life who allows her affections to be bought by the crass, self-satisfied user of a businessman, John Cleves (Jason Robards). This story is terribly dated and all of the characters overact -- down to an interior designer who is egregiously overplayed so as to seem gay. I suppose this film, which often plays like a sitcom, aspires to be a zany farce. But it drags and cries out for editing. (That extended scene in the car, with all the principals playing a silly clapping game...what drivel! Wasn't there any other way to advance this weak-kneed plot??) Fonda is pretty here but that's all I can say for her characterization of an intellectually challenged blonde. Dean Jones -- conjuring a young Jimmy Stewart -- does OK, despite all odds, as the kind of guy Ellen should have been dating -- a young man who could think beyond his own immediate gratification."I'm full of love," he tells his inamorata. "It's all right here -- just waiting for the right person to come along!" Fonda was still starting out in her career, but one wonders why the by-then respected Robards -- 44 when this was filmed but seeming much older -- accepted a gig like this!I know, someone reading this review will tell me to lighten up -- it's just a frothy comedy! Even when viewed through that tinted lens, this could have been way better.
herbqedi
THe ensemble cast is wonderful in this somewhat opened-up four-person stage play of the mid-1960s. Jason Robards commands the screen as a CEO who uses his mistress' apartment as a tax write-off and stays with her on Wednesdays when he is supposedly off on business trips. Jane Fonda is the kept woman. Rosemary Murphy is his wife. Dean Jones, in a non- Disney role, is the angry young man with business and personal grievances against CEO Cleeves (Robards). Robards is the most memorable as the winning-obsessed CEO who considers everything in his life a game and people as chess pieces to manipulate. What makes this character a cut above, however, is his wry and sometimes self-effacing sense of humor - especially after he realizes that he is stuck with more than he bargained for. Today's more critical and angry moral standards will be aghast at the premise and today's emphasis on lower-key acting, less verbiage, and more visuals will find the film's acting to be overdone and the story over-told. For people in my age bracket, this remains as free, and breezy and winning today as it was in 1966 - still a joy to watch!
blanche-2
In the days of dinner theater, many actors made a good living traveling the circuit with shows like "Any Wednesday," a Broadway play made into a film in 1966. These frothy sex comedies were all the rage on stage and in film -- Boeing Boeing, Mary, Mary, The Marriage-Go-Round, and of course, Any Wednesday.Jane Fonda plays Ellen, a young woman who is wooed and ultimately falls for an older married executive, John Cleves (Jason Robards) who makes her apartment an executive one, which is tax-deductible and enables her to live there after her roommates move out. One day, Cleves' unknowing secretary sends over a good-looking young businessman, Cass Henderson (Dean Jones) needing a place to stay for the night. It goes down a predictable path from there.The good cast makes this watchable, as it's a rather dated story. Rosemary Murphy is a delight as Cleves' wife, whom John is away from every Wednesday night on out of town business. Fonda is beautiful and sexy as the confused mistress, and Dean Jones is attractive as the frustrated Cass, who hated Cleves for business reasons but now finds that his reasons are personal as well.It's cute, and the story involves a New York blackout, though not the biggie from the early '60s.
wes-connors
Jane Fonda (she's Ellen) is the mistress whom executive Jason Robards (he's John) squeezes regularly; they have an ecstatically happy relationship, meeting every Wednesday in the "executive suite" he keeps for her. Then, into the New York apartment walks Dean Jones (he's Cass), who claims to need the phone (and a place to stay). When Rosemary Murphy (John's WIFE!) arrives, major high-jinks ensue! "Any Wednesday" is another dated 1960s situation sex comedy. The four are okay - with, perhaps Mr. Jones and Ms. Murphy surpassing their more well-known upper tier co-stars. The "split screen" telephoning is interesting; and, the script is lively with sexual innuendo. These movies seem like three-times-too-long TV half-hours comedies featuring stuff they couldn't tastefully show on TV. The "Gay Joke" comic relief is an "interior decorator" whom Murphy enlists to correct Fonda's apartment decor - it is startlingly over-the-top, like a '60s version of the "Negro Joke" character. *** Any Wednesday (1966) Robert Ellis Miller ~ Jane Fonda, Jason Robards, Dean Jones
