Product Details

• Actors: Jane Fonda, Alan Alda, Maggie Smith, Michael Caine, Walter Matthau
• Directors: Herbert Ross
• Writers: Neil Simon
• Producers: Ray Stark, Ronald L. Schwary
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, Dubbed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English
• Subtitles: Cantonese, Chinese, English, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish
• Dubbed: French
• Region: Region 1 encoding (US and Canada only)
  PLEASE NOTE: Some Region 1 DVDs may contain Regional Coding Enhancement (RCE). Some, but not all, of our international customers have had problems playing these enhanced discs on what are called "region-free" DVD players. For more information on RCE, click .
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: January 2, 2002
• Run Time: 103 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00005RYKZ
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #136,190 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Neil Simon's California Suite" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

The West Coast answer to Neil Simon's Plaza Suite, this film (written by Simon and directed by Herbert Ross) has a high Hollywood gloss. Instead of the omnibus form of the film of the New York version, this film (set at the Beverly Hills Hotel) intertwines the stories (à la Grand Hotel) of several different sets of guests, including Alan Alda and Jane Fonda and Walter Matthau and Elaine May, on one particularly eventful weekend. The story that works best involves Maggie Smith and Michael Caine as an Oscar-nominated actress and her straying, gay husband who come to an understanding (Smith won the Oscar for this film). The least effective is a slapsticky battle between well-to-do but competitive doctors played by Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor. --Marshall Fine

Product Description

A wild array of characters make Neil Simon's comic look at a posh L.A. hotel a place you'll want to visit again and again. Alan Alda, Jane Fonda, Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Walter Matthau, Michael Caine and Best Supporting Actress Oscar-winner Maggie Smith star. 103 min.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best adaptations of a Neil Simon play. December 5, 2001

By D. M. Farmbrough

Format:VHS Tape

Clever direction means that this doesn't seem too play-like and the hotel rooms never seem claustrophobic. A very strong cast is assembled here, with Caine cast against type as a closet case preparing to receive an Oscar with his bitter and scathing wife Maggie Smith. Alan Alda turns in a moving performance as Billy, and Pryor and Cosby, both usually associated with other actors, show us what a good double-act they could have been. It seems to be four plays in one, with the tone of the comedy varying from piece to piece. Alda's section is touching comedy, Walter Matthau's is farce, Caine's is wry observation while Cosby's is farce again. The brevity of the individual pieces means that the film moves along at a cracking pace, leaving you wanting more. If you do want more, I suggest Neil Simon's Plaza Suite.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars This is a hot mess, for sure... May 29, 2012

By Andrew Ellington VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

The biggest problem that I had with this film is that it never felt like a film. It always felt like a stage play, and because of that it was stagey and awkward and never more than a little stiff in nature. The intersecting stories never truly intersected and so they felt too singular. The dialog in some parts (especially in the storyline involving Alan Alda and Jane Fonda) was excruciatingly wordy and unnatural and, well, play-like which works on the stage but feels awkward on the big screen, where things are supposed to be more naturalistic in nature.

The acting though, is quite good on many fronts. It is no shock that Maggie Smith won the Oscar for her staggering portrayal of an Oscar nominated actress hoping to actually win the gold man while battling her inner turmoil over her gay husband, played beautifully by Michael Caine (one of the most interesting actors of his generation). I also thought that Jane Fonda was very good and she juggled her wordy dialog rather well, even if I found a lot of what came out of her mouth to be ridiculous. There were some sore spots though. Alda is always preachy and off-putting to me. I really wanted to enjoy Cosby and Pryor, but their whole segment was one preposterous slapstick moment after another, and they sold NONE of it. It was just a lot of falling and yelling and acting angry and none of it felt remotely genuine and it didn't even feel campy, it just felt dumb. Matthau's scenes were also blandly put together, although I found Elaine May's portrayal of his stunned wife to be rather spot on.

At the end of the day, `California Suite' is just messy. It is inconsistent and fragmented and never quite rises above its own detractors.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars More Stars Than The Grand Hotel--A Nostalgic Piece With A Stellar Cast November 4, 2010

By K. Harris HALL OF FAMETOP 10 REVIEWER

Format:DVD

There is a certain amount of contrivance and staginess to be expected in many Neil Simon film adaptations. I mention this only for viewers who may not be familiar with Simon as a playwright/screenwriter whose most successful days included "The Odd Couple" and "The Goodbye Girl." Working almost exclusively in theater and TV for the past 20 years, it seems as if he retreated from film after dabbling in original screenplays for such dubious films as "The Slugger's Wife" and "The Marrying Man." Well for good or bad, "California Suite" is pure Simon circa 1978--a West Coast riff and companion piece to his successful "Plaza Suite." If you are a Simon fan, this is undoubtedly a must-have film for a variety of reasons. If, however, you have no idea who Simon is--there is still much to recommend "California Suite."

Structured as four overlapping stories set in one Los Angeles hotel, Simon has assembled a pretty impressive array of talent. Jane Fonda and Alan Alda play a divorced couple engaged in verbal warfare over the welfare of her daughter. Fonda, anyway, is especially brutal and annoyed that Alda has assumed a laid back California persona. Walter Matthau displays his comedy chops trying to remove a prostitute from his room. Bill Cosby and Richard Pryor face off in grand slapstick fashion when only one vacancy is available. And Maggie Smith and Michael Caine are on hand from England to attend the Oscars. Smith's character has been nominated and in an amusing bit of real life, Smith won Best supporting Actress for this role! Told you it was a good cast!

"California Suite," undoubtedly, is in the middle range of Simon's oeuvre. He did get a screenplay nomination in addition to Smith's statuette. It's hard to deny the appeal of seeing this big name cast let loose. Fonda and Alda are quite good in the most dramatically rendered sequence, Matthau is a delight, and Smith and Caine are brilliant. For me, Pryor and Cosby provided the most tedious of the stories--but I can certainly understand the mainstream commercial appeal they had at the time. The whole thing does come off as a filmed play (that's the staginess and contrivance I mentioned at the get-go) which isn't a problem for me or other fans, but could be potentially off-putting to new viewers. Pretty funny, for the most part, with good to great performances. I personally could watch Smith (here in her prime) all day long! KGHarris, 11/10.