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The Small World of Sammy Lee
The Small World of Sammy Lee is a 1963 British black-and-white comedy-drama crime film written and directed by Ken Hughes and starring Anthony Newley, Julia Foster and Robert Stephens.
Sammy Lee is the striptease compère at Peepshow Club in Soho. He has five hours to pay off a £300 gambling debt, and spends the day calling in all the favours he can think of from people he knows, trying all kinds of dodgy deals to raise cash. At the same time, he has to compere the afternoon and evening sessions at the strip club. Patsy, a girl he knows from Bradford, turns up, and does everything she can to help him, including doing a turn as a stripper.
When the deadline comes, Sammy has got some of the cash, but not enough. He realises he has lost. He tells the audience at the club some home truths about the strip joint, what the girls think of them, and what lowlives they are. He decides to flee by coach to Bradford with Patsy.
At Victoria Coach Station, he finds the bookie's two thugs waiting for him, and he leaves Patsy to take the coach alone. He faces his inevitable beating. When he regains consciousness he finds that one of his attackers has had a change of heart, and has left his wallet and cash beside him.
The film was based on the 1958 BBC TV one-character television play Sammy, also directed by Hughes and starring Newley, described by Variety as "a masterful piece of work."
The original TV play was adapted for American TV in 1958 as Eddie on Alcoa Theatre, starring Mickey Rooney and directed by Jack Smight. The production was censored at the last minute: during the final scene Rooney's character is beaten up, but the sponsors worried that this was too violent, so instead the screen went dark for twenty seconds. Variety called it "interesting, at times exciting." Both Rooney and Smight won Emmies for the show.
The original TV play was very successful and Hughes had requests to turn it into a feature film, but he was reluctant, considering that the one-person aspect of the story was crucial. In 1959 he was going to make the film for Warwick Productions but had not written the film.
Eventually he decided to adapt it, but he disliked the job he did. "I did everything wrong," he said. "I opened the story out in all the obvious ways. I showed what was happening at the other end of the telephone calls, for instance, when Sammy's end was all that was really needed." He then did another version, which he liked.
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The Small World of Sammy Lee
The Small World of Sammy Lee is a 1963 British black-and-white comedy-drama crime film written and directed by Ken Hughes and starring Anthony Newley, Julia Foster and Robert Stephens.
Sammy Lee is the striptease compère at Peepshow Club in Soho. He has five hours to pay off a £300 gambling debt, and spends the day calling in all the favours he can think of from people he knows, trying all kinds of dodgy deals to raise cash. At the same time, he has to compere the afternoon and evening sessions at the strip club. Patsy, a girl he knows from Bradford, turns up, and does everything she can to help him, including doing a turn as a stripper.
When the deadline comes, Sammy has got some of the cash, but not enough. He realises he has lost. He tells the audience at the club some home truths about the strip joint, what the girls think of them, and what lowlives they are. He decides to flee by coach to Bradford with Patsy.
At Victoria Coach Station, he finds the bookie's two thugs waiting for him, and he leaves Patsy to take the coach alone. He faces his inevitable beating. When he regains consciousness he finds that one of his attackers has had a change of heart, and has left his wallet and cash beside him.
The film was based on the 1958 BBC TV one-character television play Sammy, also directed by Hughes and starring Newley, described by Variety as "a masterful piece of work."
The original TV play was adapted for American TV in 1958 as Eddie on Alcoa Theatre, starring Mickey Rooney and directed by Jack Smight. The production was censored at the last minute: during the final scene Rooney's character is beaten up, but the sponsors worried that this was too violent, so instead the screen went dark for twenty seconds. Variety called it "interesting, at times exciting." Both Rooney and Smight won Emmies for the show.
The original TV play was very successful and Hughes had requests to turn it into a feature film, but he was reluctant, considering that the one-person aspect of the story was crucial. In 1959 he was going to make the film for Warwick Productions but had not written the film.
Eventually he decided to adapt it, but he disliked the job he did. "I did everything wrong," he said. "I opened the story out in all the obvious ways. I showed what was happening at the other end of the telephone calls, for instance, when Sammy's end was all that was really needed." He then did another version, which he liked.