Fuzz *** (1972, Burt Reynolds, Raquel Welch, Jack Weston, Tom Skerritt, Yul Brynner) – Classic Movie Review 7929

The rumbustious 1972 crime action comedy Fuzz stars Burt Reynolds, Jack Weston, Tom Skerritt, Yul Brynner and Raquel Welch. Reynolds recalled: ‘I did like working again with Raquel. And I liked the writer whose book the film was based on, Ed McBain.’ 

Director Richard A Colla’s rumbustious 1972 crime action comedy Fuzz is based on a novel by Evan Hunter (writing as Ed McBain) and stars Burt Reynolds, Jack Weston, Tom Skerritt, Yul Brynner and Raquel Welch.

As Boston police detectives Steve Carella and Meyer Meyer, Reynolds and Weston dress as pretty unlikely nuns, and cops Detective Bert Kling (Skerritt) and Detective Eileen McHenry (Welch) are strange bedfellows – in the line of duty of course – as they set out to track down the Deaf Man (Brynner)’s mad murderous bomber and become embroiled in a serial rape case.

Fuzz is a darkly comic action tale of inept cops, with the screenplay written with plenty of dodgy bad taste by Evan Hunter (aka Ed McBain) based on his 1968 novel Fuzz, one his own series of novels about the 87th Precinct, written under the name Ed McBain. The 87th Precinct book series is set in a fictional metropolis based on New York City, but the film Fuzz is set and shot on location in Boston, Massachusetts.

Fuzz is energetic and fairly agreeable, thanks to the lively situations and the game performances, but it is very fuzzy in both the joke and thrill departments. The film’s soundtrack score, composed by Dave Grusin, is a lively asset.

Also in the cast are James McEachin, Bert Remsen, Peter Bonerz, Steve Inhat, James Victor, Roy Applegate, Tom Lawrence, Norman Burton, Vince Howard, Dominic Chianese, Dan Frazer, Stewart Moss, H Benny Markowitz, Jake Lexa, Britt Leach, Brian Doyle-Murray, Harold Oblong, J S Johnson, Harry Eldon Miller, David Dreyer, William Martel, Cal Bellini, Don Gordon, Charles Tyner, Gary Morgan, Charles Martin Smith, Tamara Dobson, George Reynolds, Albert Popwell, Ron Tannas, Barry Hamilton, Roy Morton and Felipe Turich.

It is the film debut of Dominic Chianese, Johnny Ola in The Godfather: Part II and Uncle Junior in TV’s The Sopranos.

Reynolds recalled: ‘It was made by one of those hot shot TV directors. I liked working with Jack Weston; it began our relationship. I did like working again with Raquel. And I liked the writer whose book the film was based on, Ed McBain.’ Welch and Reynolds previously starred together in 100 Rifles (1969).

Raquel Welch was paid $100,000 for nine days work but she refused to film a scene where her character appears in her bra and panties in the men’s room.

Violent incidents in Boston and Miami in 1973 were supposedly linked to Fuzz. As a result, TV networks had to curb their violence throughout the rest of the Seventies and Fuzz was pulled from TV screenings until it returned uncut on cable years later.

The opening credits sequence was filmed in and around Charlestown’s City Square station. Other Boston locations include the North End, the Boston Common and the Public Garden, where Reynolds runs round disguised as a nun.

Ed McBain (15 October 1926 – 6 July 2005) was born Salvatore Albert Lombino, but legally adopted the name Evan Hunter in 1952, though he was even better known as Ed McBain, which he used for most of his crime fiction, beginning in 1956. 

Reynolds appeared on the original poster almost naked on a rug in a jokey re-creation of his 1972 nude centerfold for Cosmopolitan.

RIP much-missed Burt Reynolds (1936–2018).

Raquel Welch died at her home in Los Angeles on 15 February 2023 after a brief illness, aged 82.

Raquel Welch [Jo Raquel Tejada] was first cast in small roles in A House Is Not a Home (1964) and the Elvis Presley musical Roustabout (1964). Her first featured role was in the beach film A Swingin’ Summer (1965). She landed a seven-year non-exclusive contract with 20th Century Fox. After casting Welch in a leading role in Fantastic Voyage, 20th Century Fox loaned her to Hammer Studios in Britain where she starred in the spectacular 1966 prehistoric fantasy adventure One Million Years BC, as Loana the Fair One, dressed only in mankind’s first two-piece deer skin bikini. 

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7929

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com