Lost in Yonkers (film)

In 1942 in the Bronx, Evelyn Kurnitz has just died following a lengthy illness. Her husband, Eddie Kurnitz, needs to take a job as a traveling salesman to pay off the medical bills incurred. Eddie decides to ask his stern and forbidding mother, from whom he is slightly estranged, if his two early-teen sons, Jay and Arty (whom their Grandma calls by their full given names, Yakob and Arthur), can live with her and their Aunt Bella Kurnitz in Yonkers. His mother refuses at first but reluctantly agrees after Bella threatens to leave her if the boys aren't allowed to stay.

Despite their Grandmother owning and operating a candy store, Jay and Arty don't like their new living situation. They are afraid of their cold and distant Grandmother and find it difficult to relate to their crazy Aunt Bella, whose slow mental state is manifested by perpetual excitability and a short attention span, which outwardly comes across as a childlike demeanor. Into their collective lives returns one of Eddie and Bella's other siblings, Louie Kurnitz, a henchman for gangsters. He is hiding out from Hollywood Harry, who wants what Louie stole and which he is hiding in a small black bag.

Jay and Arty's mission becomes how to make money fast so they can help their father and move back in together, which may entail stealing the $15,000 their Grandma has hidden somewhere. Bella's mission is to find a way to tell the family she wants to marry Johnny, her equally slow movie theater usher boyfriend; the two could also use $5,000 of Grandma's hidden money to open their dream restaurant. Louie's objective is merely to survive the next couple of days.

• Richard Dreyfuss as Louie Kurnitz
• Mercedes Ruehl as Bella Kurnitz
• Irene Worth as Grandma Kurnitz
• Mike Damus as Arty Kurnitz
• Brad Stoll as Jay Kurnitz
• David Strathairn as Johnny

After eleven previews, the Broadway production, directed by Gene Saks, opened on February 21, 1991, at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, where it ran for 780 performances. The original cast included Jamie Marsh, Irene Worth, Mercedes Ruehl, and Kevin Spacey.

The film holds a score of 71% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 17 reviews.[2] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade of "B+" on scale of A+ to F.[3]

Roger Ebert gave the film three stars out of four and wrote, "All of the performances are good, but one of them, by Mercedes Ruehl, casts a glow over the entire film."[4] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune awarded two-and-a-half stars out of four and wrote, "A wonderful play about a classically unhappy household that has been turned into a typical, mechanical Neil Simon joke machine. Simon's stage words rarely transfer well to the more realistic arena of film, and this is no exception. Another liability is that Richard Dreyfuss hams his way through a role that was played with dignity and poignancy on stage by Kevin Spacey."[5] Janet Maslin of The New York Times described the film as "sometimes more picturesque than powerful. But it conveys all the warmth and color of the original material."[6] Todd McCarthy of Variety wrote "Story of a domineering old woman's tyranny over two generations of offspring is adroitly structured and contains strong human elements, but what proved so affecting onstage seems a bit pat and calculated when viewed in closeup."[7] Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times described the film as "essentially deep-dish Neil Simon, which is, after all, not so very deep. But neither is the play negligible; it has a felt, melancholy undertow, and Ruehl and Worth, who both won Tonys for their performances on Broadway, bring out its full, racking sadness."[8] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote "In the film version, with Ruehl and Worth repeating their Tony-winning roles, Simon intensifies the barrage of belly laughs and bathos. Director Martha Coolidge, whose Rambling Rose was a model of graceful literary adaptation, seems at a loss with the crass material."[9]

• Lost in Yonkers at IMDb
• Lost in Yonkers at Box Office Mojo
• Lost in Yonkers at AllMovie
• Lost in Yonkers at the Internet Broadway Database
• Lost in Yonkers at Rotten Tomatoes