A New Leaf
Elaine May’s hilarious, edgy first feature is her only one to differ substantially from what she intended. Her three-hour rough cut included two murders committed by the antihero (Walter Matthau), who killed a blackmailer and a crooked lawyer (Jack Weston), that the studio excised, yet A NEW LEAF registers with audiences as her sweetest, most tender picture. The irony is that Matthau’s character – a self-absorbed lout who exhausts his inheritance, then goes looking for a wealthy bride he can murder in order to keep his luxuries (finding a clueless, clumsy botanist to this end, deftly played by May) – is hardly the sort who one expects to elicit such emotions, even without the two murders. But as a specialist in creating lovable monsters, predators and innocents alike, May is clearly up to the challenge.
Reading Jack Ritchie’s short story The Green Heart that she adapted clarifies the much blacker comedy she had in mind, which would have reached her sweet finale only after more challenging discomforts en route. And what she added to this story – such as Ferreri, the antihero’s butler and uncle, and two potential brides preceding the botanist – may matter as much as what the studio removed. (Jonathan Rosenbaum)
- Walter Matthau - Henry Graham
- Elaine May - Henrietta Lowell
- Jack Weston - Andy McPherson
- George Rose - Harold
- Elaine May (nach der Kurzgeschichte „The Green Heart“ von Jack Ritchie)
- Gayne Rescher
- Lee Bos
- David Dockendorf
- Don Guidice
- Fredric Steinkamp
- Edward Beyer
- Warren Clymer
- Richard Fried
- Anthea Sylbert