Semi-Tough is a 1977 American sports comedy film directed by Michael Ritchie and starring Burt Reynolds, Kris Kristofferson, Jill Clayburgh, Robert Preston, Lotte Lenya, and Bert Convy. It is set in the world of American professional football.
The film is based on the 1972 novel of the same name by Dan Jenkins. It was adapted for the screen by writer Walter Bernstein and director Ritchie, who added a new storyline that included a satire of the self-help movement and new religions. The film includes a parody of Werner Erhard's Erhard Seminars Training (est), depicted in the film as an organization called "B.E.A.T.".
Semi-Tough follows the story of pro football friends Billy Clyde Puckett and Marvin "Shake" Tiller, who have a third roommate, Barbara Jane Bookman. A romance develops between Shake and Barbara Jane when he becomes self-confident after completing a self awareness course called "B.E.A.T.", at which point Billy Clyde slyly makes a play to win her for himself.
The film received mixed receptions. Some reviewers praised its parodies of the est training, Erhard and other new age movements such as Rolfing. Others criticized the script and direction, noting that some of director Ritchie's previous films had more of a personal tone. Still other reviews lamented the film's departure from the novel Semi-Tough, which dealt with football rather than the new age movement.
Plot
Wide receiver Marvin "Shake" Tiller and running back Billy Clyde Puckett are football buddies who play for a Miami pro team owned by "Big Ed" Bookman. Bookman's daughter Barbara Jane is roommates with both men, and the film depicts a subtle love triangle relationship developing between Barbara Jane and her two friends. Initially the three of them are just good friends, but she begins to have romantic feelings for Shake, who has become more self-confident after taking self-improvement training from seminar leader Friedrich Bismark. When the trainees are encouraged to express their most repressed feelings, he exhibits the strongest, most primal display of them all. Shake is surprised to see Billy Clyde emerge from Barbara Jane's B.E.A.T. training session. Billy Clyde "confesses" to Shake that he took the training so that he'd be able to mock it more effectively afterwards, but says that he actually "got it". For a time, he pretends he underwent a conversion to Bismark's way of thinking, often using B.E.A.T. terminology and clichés in everyday conversation.
Shake worries that Barbara Jane hasn't "gotten it", and Billy Clyde tries to reassure Shake that it doesn't matter, but Shake remains dubious. During the wedding, as Big Ed escorts Barbara Jane to the altar, the minister turns to Bismark and gives him some advice on how he can avoid capital gains tax in his business. Jenkins later commented that the film adaptation of his book Baja Oklahoma was: "a lot more faithful to the novel than Semi-Tough ever was".
Preparation
Burt Reynolds began training with Kris Kristofferson to get in shape before film production. Before work began on the film, actor Bert Convy attended one of Werner Erhard's est training sessions to prepare for his role as B.E.A.T. seminar leader Friedrich Bismark. Pro football stars were hired to give realism to the film, including John Matuszak, Paul Hornung, Joe Kapp, and Ed "Too Tall" Jones.
Parodies of self-improvement, new religions
Bernstein and Ritchie's modified screenplay based on Jenkins' book includes a storyline with "satiric jabs" at new religions, self-improvement, and the Human Potential Movement. A form of Rolfing is also parodied in the film by Lotte Lenya, whose character Clara Pelf is seen as a spoof of "a Rolf-like masseuse". In American Film Now, Friedrich Bismark is simply described as "the Werner Erhard character".
After Semi-Toughs release in 1977, Bert Convy was contacted by a number of est followers, as well as by Werner Erhard. During actual filming on Semi-Tough, Convy received a late-night phone call from actress Valerie Harper, known in Hollywood as a devoted student of Werner Erhard. The 1980 series starred Bruce McGill playing Burt Reynolds' original role Billy Clyde Puckett, with co-star David Hasselhoff. The film has since been released in both VHS and DVD formats.
Critical reception
thumb|130px|[[Burt Reynolds, 1991: Leonard Maltin wrote that Reynolds' charm made up for deficiencies in the script of Semi-Tough. The Charlotte Observer praised Bert Convy's portrayal of the self-help guru Frederick Bismark, and called Convy: "… a hilariously smug consciousness-raiser with a more than passing resemblance to EST's [sic] Werner Erhard". Magill's Survey of Cinema described the film as a chiding of American "religious fads and philosophies",
The film did not receive a positive review in Variety, where the reviewer commented: "Semi-Tough begins as a bawdy and lively romantic comedy about slap-happy pro football players, then slows down to a too-inside putdown of contemporary self-help programs." Variety noted that stars Burt Reynolds, Kris Kristofferson, and Jill Clayburgh were "excellent" within the "zigzag" script and poor direction they were given. In American Film Now, author James Monaco commented on director Michael Ritchie's directing style in Semi-Tough, stating that in the film Ritchie was "speaking in a professional voice". Leonard Maltin criticized parts of the script, stating that Reynolds' charm filled in for the film's other deficiencies. I. Moyer Hunsberger criticized Ritchie's screenplay adaptation in his work The Quintessential Dictionary, complaining that the game of football should have supported the film as a plot device, but was instead left to the side in favor of other stories.
See also
- List of American football films