Play It as It Lays (film)

Play It as It Lays is a 1972 American drama film directed by Frank Perry. The screenplay by married couple Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne is based on Didions novel of the same name. The film stars Tuesday Weld and Anthony Perkins, who had previously paired together for the 1968 film, Pretty Poison.

Reflecting back on what brought her here, Maria recalls driving around Los Angeles in her yellow Corvette and spending time with her closest friend, B.Z. Mendenhall, an unhappy man who is gay. Maria has a braindamaged daughter, Kate, who is being kept in a sanitarium at the insistence of Carter, who resents Maria visiting the girl so frequently. Marias secret desire is to live somewhere with Kate and find some kind of joy in life together.Maria has been having an affair with Les Goodwin, a screenwriter. When she tells Carter she is pregnant, he demands she get an abortion. Maria goes to Las Vegas and has a fling with a mobconnected lawyer, Larry Kulik, and later returns to L.A. and has a onenight stand with Johnny Waters, a television star who needs to watch his own show on TV to get in the mood. ........

Source: Wikipedia