Synopsis

In 1938 New York, struggling actors Arthur and Maurice survive through petty schemes and theatrical bravado. After mocking a celebrated actor, they become fugitives and hide aboard an ocean liner. Their escape turns into a chaotic voyage involving stowaways, eccentric passengers, criminal plots, and the very actor they were fleeing.

Factoids & Trivia

• The film was conceived around the long-running friendship and stage partnership of Stanley Tucci and Oliver Platt, who had acted together at Yale and previously appeared as dognappers in Beethoven (1992).

• Tucci completed the screenplay in late 1996, and production began by mid-1997. Fox Searchlight financed the film with an $8 million budget.

• Its visual and comic approach deliberately recalls 1930s screwball comedy, with the opening silent-film sequence serving as an especially direct nod to earlier screen farce.

• Because sustained period filming in a modern city would have been expensive and difficult, much of the ocean-liner material was shot on a specially built set at Silvercup Studios in Queens. Location work took place in New York and New Jersey.

• The film premiered in the United States on October 2, 1998, after appearing in the Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival in May of that year.

• Tucci later described the movie as one he regretted making, despite the film's continuing appeal to viewers who enjoy old-fashioned ensemble farce.