Jack Lemmon tried his hand at directing on only one occasion - "Kotch," the 1971 comedy-drama starring his buddy Walter Matthau that airs on Turner on Tursday, 15 January at 5:15 a.m., est., as part of its Lemmon tribute.
He seemingly stopped there. Seemingly.
In the early 1980s, Lemmon was once on board to direct a film version of John Ford Noonan's off-Broadway hit, "A Coupla White Chicks Sitting Around Talking," for Burt Sugarman (the producer-husband of Mary Hart who would go on to produce the film of another play, Mark Medoff's "Children of a Lesser God," in 1986).
"White Chicks," adapted for the screen first by Noonan himself and then by Wendy Wasserstein, was to star Jill Clayburgh and Susan Sarandon, the latter having appeared in the piece on stage opposite Eileen Brennan.
20th Century-Fox went so far as to design pre-production ads for the film, but the project never came together.
(Artwork: Pre-production ad from a Variety pullout, circa 1981, for the shelved "A Coupla White Chicks Sitting Around Talking" film)
Hey, this could have been a winner! Still could. Does the studio still own the rights to it? I doubt it. I would love to read Wasserstein's screenplay though.
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