Coming up on TV: Sweet Smell of Success

Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster in Sweet Smell of Success

Billy Wilder’s 1957 Sweet Smell of Success contains Tony Curtis’ most subtly acted role.  Curtis is a Broadway press agent who is completely at the mercy of Burt Lancaster’s sadistically nasty columnist.  Many of us have experienced being vulnerable to the caprice of an extremely mean person – Curtis perfectly captures the dread and humiliation of being in that position.  Plays December 6 on TCM.