Vitals

Ian McShane as Anthony Wood, controlling Hollywood husband and ex-convict

French Riviera, Late summer 1972

Film: The Last of Sheila
Release Date: June 14, 1973
Director: Herbert Ross
Costume Designer: Joel Schumacher

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

One of my favorite “summer vibes” movies is The Last of Sheila, which I first watched last summer after learning that it was among Rian Johnson’s inspiration for Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. As the third Knives Out movie has commenced filming and we’re approaching another summer solstice, let’s revisit the Riviera style on parade in The Last of Sheila, released 51 years ago this month on Flag Day 1973.

Written by Stephen Sondheim and Anthony Perkins, The Last of Sheila boasts a fine ensemble cast portraying “six hungry failures” summoned by Hollywood producer Clinton Greene (James Coburn) to spend a week in the Ligurian Sea aboard his yacht, Sheila, named for his late wife who died exactly a year earlier in a mysterious hit-and-run.

After Clinton is murdered during his festivities, the six frenemies begin looking amongst each other for who would have had the means and opportunity to kill Clinton, though all had a motive—presumably to silence the gossip he knew about each of their pasts, revealed by the cards he had assigned to each on their first day at sea.

Perhaps the least connected of the six is the charismatic but shady Anthony Wood (Ian McShane), who fiercely promotes—and controls—the career of his glamorous actress wife Alice (Raquel Welch). When the “I am an EX-CONVICT” card held by the anxious Lee Parkman (Joan Hackett) is revealed to apply to Anthony’s dual convictions for assault, Lee’s writer husband Tom (Richard Benjamin) briefly focuses his interrogation on Anthony as the group tries to solve the mystery. Continue reading →