A Bunch of Amateurs

2008
1h 36m

IMDb RATING

6.0/10

1.2K

YOUR RATING

A sleazy Hollywood agent tricks one of his clients, a faded action star, into playing King Lear in an amateur charity production in England.

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Comedy

A sleazy Hollywood agent tricks one of his clients, a faded action star, into playing King Lear in an amateur charity production in England.A sleazy Hollywood agent tricks one of his clients, a faded action star, into playing King Lear in an amateur charity production in England.A sleazy Hollywood agent tricks one of his clients, a faded action star, into playing King Lear in an amateur charity production in England.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.0/10

1.2K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

User reviews23

Featured review

8/10

Fantastic fun for am-dram

I saw this twice today on DVD and loved it. Of course, it's pure fantasy and I wish it had really been shot in one of Suffolk's Stratfords, though the Isle of Man serves well enough. Burt Reynolds does grumpy very well and, as ever, isn't afraid to send himself up - and nor is the great Derek Jacobi as his bitchy rival. I thought Imelda Staunton's turn as his adoring, then disillusioned fan overdone, but Samantha Bond is a tour de force as his less enchanted director. The build-up to the storm scene is ingenious and when he gets out of his vehicle Reynolds shows that he can cut the mustard as Lear. Of course, the other members of the Stratford Theatre Company are improbably good actors, but I shan't complain. The final twist is an extra treat. What a shame only Her Majesty seems to have seen the film in the cinema

brice-18
May 17, 2009
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Storyline

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Trivia
In a radio interview broadcast May 20, 2013 on BBC Radio 2 in the United Kingdon, Samantha Bond described some of the behind-the-scenes tensions during the making of this movie. She stated that Burt Reynolds' "high maintenance" behavior on-set bore some resemblance to the actions of his character. This behavior, Bond stated, included locking himself in his trailer and having to be coaxed out by the director or producer, not making much of an effort to mix with or get to know many of the rest of the cast (Samantha Bond excepted), and not learning his lines.

Quotes
Jefferson Steel: You know what happened to the last director who thought they were smarter than me?
Dorothy Nettle: They won an Oscar?

Crazy credits
The end credits for the main cast appear one at a time as the actors in the play take their curtain call and bow to the audience in the theatre or, alternatively, in twos as they're sitting in the audience, applauding.