They All Laughed

Shot on the streets of New York, THEY ALL LAUGHED follows the lighter-than-air misadventures of a trio of love-struck detectives. Ladies’ man Ben Gazzara pursues unhappily married Audrey Hepburn, pratfallhappy John Ritter falls (literally and figuratively) for Dorothy Stratten, and curly-haired stoner Blaine Novak throws himself at anything that moves. Meanwhile, Colleen Camp steals scenes as a countrypolitan songbird who’s a dynamite broad in the best sense of the term, a tough-talking chatterbox with more balls than any of her male co-stars.
Intended as a love letter to film, love, New York City, and especially his then-partner Dorothy Stratten, Bogdanovich’s delicate trifle was spoiled by Stratten’s murder at the hands of her jealous husband. When no distributor would release THEY ALL LAUGHED, Bogdanovich sank a huge chunk of his personal fortune into releasing it himself, the ultimate quixotic romantic gesture for a film dizzy from start to finish with l’amour fou. (Nathan Rabin)