Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle

Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle is a 1994 American film scripted by screenwriterdirector Alan Rudolph and former Washington Star reporter Randy Sue Coburn. Directed by Rudolph, it starred Jennifer Jason Leigh as the writer Dorothy Parker and depicted the members of the Algonquin Round Table, a group of writers, actors and critics who met almost every weekday from 1919 to 1929, at Manhattans Algonquin Hotel.

Director Alan Rudolph was fascinated with the Algonquin Round Table as a child when he discovered Gluyas Williams illustrations in a collection of Robert Benchleys essays. After making The Moderns, a film about American expatriates in 1920s Paris, Rudolph wanted to tackle a factbased drama set in the same era. He began work on a screenplay with novelist and former Washington Star journalist Randy Sue Coburn about legendary writer Dorothy Parker. In 1992, Rudolph attended a Fourth of July party hosted by filmmaker Robert Altman who introduced him to actress Jennifer Jason Leigh. Rudolph was surprised by her physical resemblance to Parker and was impressed by her knowledge of the Jazz Age. Leigh was so committed to doing the film that she agreed to make it for a tenth of what I normally get for a film.The screenplay originally focused on the platonic relationship between Parker and Robert Benchley, but this did not appeal to any financial backers. There still was no interest even when Altman came on board as producer. The emphasis on Parker was the next change to the script, but Rudolph still had no luck finding financing for a period biography of a literate woman. Altman used his clout to persuade Fine Line Features and Miramax two studios he was making films for to team up, with the former releasing Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle domestically and the latter handling foreign distribution. Altman claimed that he forced the film to be made by putting his own money into it and I put other projects of mine hostage to it. I did a lot of lying. ........

Source: Wikipedia