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    Nostalgia Central
    Home»Movies»Movies by Decade»Movies - 1980s
    Movies - 1980s Movies - S 2 Mins Read

    Stir Crazy (1981)

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    There was an improvisational air to much of the dialogue spouted by both Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor in Stir Crazy, a frenetic prison farce designed to juxtapose the very different comic talents of its two stars.

    Both losers – Skip Donahue (Wilder) is a would-be playwright and Harry Monroe (Pryor) a would-be actor – they decide to try California after making no headway in New York and set off on the long drive in their battered van.

    In Arizona, however, they are arrested for a bank robbery they didn’t commit (via a case of chicken-suited mistaken identity) and are given 120 years in the slammer.

    How they manage to outwit their warders, guards, and fellow prisoners (one of whom is a crazed killer, and another a lisping gay man) was the main concern of the film, which Wilder and Pryor merely used as a springboard for doing their own thing while director Sidney Poitier seemed to simply point the camera in the direction of his stars – with erratic results.

    stircrazy8

    A short-lived 1985-1986 CBS TV series of the same name starred Joe Guzaldo and Larry Riley as Skip Harrington and Harry Fletcher. The pair escaped from their prison chain gang and went in search of the real killer (Marc Silver). Chasing them was Captain Betty Phillips (Jeannie Wilson).

    Skip Donahue
    Gene Wilder
    Harry Monroe
    Richard Pryor
    Rory Schultebrand
    George Stanford Brown
    Grossberger
    Erland Van Lidth de Jeude
    Meredith
    JoBeth Williams
    Jesus Ramirez
    Miguel Angel Suarez
    Deputy Ward Wilson
    Craig T Nelson
    Warden Walter Beatty
    Barry Corbin
    Warden Henry Sampson
    Nicolas Coster
    Blade
    Charles Weldon
    Len Garber
    Joel Brooks
    Jack Graham
    Jonathan Banks
    Teresa Ramirez
    Karmin Murcelo

    Director
    Sidney Poitier

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    Put some beefiness into your mid-week menu with these recipe ideas published in a Birds Eye advertisement from the Radio Times on 30 September 1965.

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