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America's Sweethearts
America's Sweethearts theatrical poster
Directed by	Joe Roth
Produced by	Billy Crystal Donna Arkoff Roth Susan Arnold Charles Newirth Peter Tolan
Written by	Billy Crystal Peter Tolan
Starring	Julia Roberts Billy Crystal Catherine Zeta-Jones John Cusack Hank Azaria Stanley Tucci Christopher Walken Seth Green
Music by	James Newton Howard
Cinematography	Phedon Papamichael Jr.
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures
Release date(s)	July 20, 2001
Running time	102 min.
Country	United States
Language	English
Budget	$48,000,000 (estimated)

America's Sweethearts is a 2001 romantic comedy film, directed by Joe Roth, starring Julia Roberts, Billy Crystal, John Cusack, and Catherine Zeta-Jones. The film also stars Hank Azaria, Stanley Tucci, Seth Green, Alan Arkin, and Christopher Walken, and features a cameo appearance by Larry King as himself. It was written by Crystal and Peter Tolan.

Plot

Lee Phillips (Crystal) is a movie publicist with a major problem with movie stars Gwen Harrison (Zeta-Jones) and Eddie Thomas (Cusack), who are known as "America's Sweethearts". The couple have recently split, with Gwen pairing up with a Spanish actor, Hector (Azaria), and Eddie in a rest home, getting therapy. Hal Weidmann (Walken), the eccentric director of their latest film together, has demanded that the first viewing of the film - before even anyone at the studio sees it - be at a press junket. Lee's job is to keep up the illusion that Gwen and Eddie are still a couple, getting them back together at least until the press junket for the movie.

Complicating matters is the fact that Eddie is starting to fall for Gwen's personal assistant, Kiki (Roberts), who is also Gwen's sister. When the movie is finally shown at the press junket, the actors and others involved with film, and the press, discover to their horror that Weidmann essentially junked the script and instead delivered a movie composed of footage shot making the movie - much taken without the actors' knowledge. Essentially, Weidmann has delivered Hollywood's first "Reality Movie". The footage shows Gwen as self-centered, conniving and manipulative and Eddie as a man slowly becoming more and more paranoid as he (correctly) suspects his wife is having an affair.

Gwen attempts to resolve the situation by announcing the couple is reuniting, but Eddie finds the courage to admit his love for Kiki.

Cast

Critical response

Reviews for America's Sweethearts were generally unfavorable as the film holds a 31% at Rotten Tomatoes. Critic's consensus was, "Despite its famous cast, the movie lacks sympathetic characters and is only funny in spurts." Roger Ebert gave it 2 out of 4 stars.

Box office performance

The film opened at #2 in its first opening weekend at the U.S. Box office, behind Jurassic Park 3. "America's Sweethearts" was a box office success and grossed over $138 million worldwide.^[1]

References

External links

• America's Sweethearts at the Internet Movie Database
• America's Sweethearts at Rotten Tomatoes
• America's Sweethearts at Metacritic
• America's Sweethearts at Box Office Mojo