The Birthday Party (film)

The Birthday Party is a 1968 British drama film directed by William Friedkin, and starring Robert Shaw, based on the 1957 play The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter. The screenplay for the film was written by Pinter as well. The film, and the play, are considered examples of comedy of menace, a genre associated with Pinter.

The protagonist is a lodger in his late 30s named Stanley Webber, played by Robert Shaw, who is staying at a seaside boarding house he is visited by two unexpected additional guests, menacing and mysterious strangers, Goldberg Sydney Tafler and McCann Patrick Magee. Their neighbour, Lulu Helen Fraser brings her a parcel, a boys toy drum presented to Stanley as his birthday present. Goldberg and McCann offer to host Stanleys birthday party after Stanleys landlady, Meg Boles, played by Dandy Nichols, tells them that it is Stanleys birthday, although Stanley protests that it is really not his birthday. In the course of the party, Goldberg and McCann break Stanley down and ultimately take him away from the house purportedly to get medical attention from Monty in their car. The film ends as the play ends after Megs husband Petey Moultrie Kelsall, a deckchair attendant, who did not attend the party because he was out playing chess, calls after Stanley, Stan, dont let them tell you what to do at the end, Meg, still somewhat hung over, is unaware that Stanley has been taken away, since Petey has not told her that, and tells him that she was the belle of the ball.The movie was a passion project of director William Friedkin who called it the first film I really wanted to make, understood and felt passionate about. He had first seen the play in San Francisco in 1962, and managed to get the film version funded by Edgar Scherick at Palomar Pictures, in part because it could be made relatively cheaply. Pinter wrote the screenplay himself and was heavily involved in casting. To this day I dont think our cast could have been improved, wrote Friedkin later. ........

Source: Wikipedia