Synopsis: Wes and Nancy are a married academics couple. Mind games coil when Nancy's long-ago lover, Matt, and his current, sexy girlfriend, Kim, come visit for a weekend. When Wes suspects Kim of stealing $50 from him, tension, intrigues and mistrust ensue against a backdrop of sexual and professional jealousy.

Cast:
David Strathairn .... Wes
Bonnie Bedelia .... Nancy
Saul Rubinek .... Matt
Caroleen Feeney .... Kim Matthews
Julie Harris .... Professor Harper
Daniel Koch .... Musicologist
Steve Forbert .... Coffeehouse Troubadour

Favorite Quotes:
• Wes: "Fuck you."
Nancy: "Might want to try that once-in-awhile."

• "Must be shooting blanks, Wes." - Kim

• "Wild card." - Wes

• Wes: "Are you out of your mind?"
Nancy: "I don't think I am..."

• "You're the one who went off half-cocked, telling me I cheated on my wife. You better feel damn lucky that we're treating this as a joke." - Wes

Notes:
• Bad Manners is based off of the screenplay, Ghost in the Machine, by playwright David Gilman.
• Bad Manners was shot in record timing: eighteen days.
• Director Jonathan Kaufer won the Breakthrough Award at the Denver International Film Festival for his work on Bad Manners.

Critical Praise & Commentary:
• "Solid performances and some well plotted story elements make this filmed version of a stage play worthwhile." -Chuck Dowling, Daily Reviews

• "The movie is more about games than about psychological reality, and all the more fun because of that. There is a masochistic sense in which all of the characters are enjoying themselves with their mind games, especially Wes. And at least Kim, before she leaves, is able to provide Nancy with a useful suggestion." -Roger Ebert, Chicago-Sun Times

• "It's also a showcase for some pretty fine film acting. Strathairn is merely typically sublime, willing to immerse himself in Wes's fragile self-image and frustrated desires." -Scott Renshaw, Apollo Movie Guide

(David On His Role:)
• "It's a great metaphor for when he [Matt, Saul Rubinek's character] says, 'The layers and layers of music are built up and, if you peal all the layers away, you might hear something very pure.' But we've built all these layers over our lives in our personalities that what's really true down inside is so hidden." -David Strathairn, 1997, DVD interview

• [speaking about the story and playing his character] "Not to tip the hand too much; almost to deceive yourself, to have the character deceive himself and not tell the audience what's really going on in the mind and to keep the subtext apparent but not obvious. You know, that there's something going on underneath but we're not sure what it is and to tread that line of, 'Oh, yes. He did this, she did that. No, they didn't do that. Who's telling the truth? Who's fabricating what?' So, it's a very little, tight rope of intention." -David Strathairn, 1997, DVD interview

(Jonathan Kaufer On David:)
• "This is probably a good point to mention David Strathairn... David's the last person who would ever say he's proud of himself, which speaks to part of his specialness as a person and, as an actor, he's probably--I think Saul would agree--one of the most generous, gifted men I've ever come across in this business not necessarily known for the generosity of its players. David actually would sleep on the set when we had a late wrap; he would move props and cables--such a team player. And, as if that weren't enough, it came in the package of his incredible talent. I could not have been more fortunate in filling that role." -Jonathan Kaufer, director, DVD commentary

• "Now, this is interesting. David Strathairn--I love David, I love all these characters. But David, you know, his character is such an inept human being on every level. Originally, in David Gillman's script, David had him gardening, and I encouraged David to open up the thing to more locations but gardening's too massive. He's theatre for me. I thought it would be much more fun to have David really trying to be Dagwood Burstead. He's trying to be Fred McMurry, The Three Sons. The handy man." -Jonathan Kaufer, director, DVD commentary

• "Should we mention David's distinctive ankle? You know, David has a very distinctive ankle. I'll say no more. Everyone asked me when I told some friends in L.A. that worked with David, I think on the film Iceman, they said, 'We use to play [a] pick-up basketball game with him. Have you seen his ankle?' I didn't know whether it's something I could ask him about, but I finally gathered up the courage and saw the ankle and that's all I'm going to say about it." -Jonathan Kaufer, director, DVD commentary

• "David and I both fell in love with the character of Wes. He is such a perverse, angry and completely inept character. He's a very pure character in the sense that you could plop him down in any environment and know exactly how he would behave. A writer friend of mine, Bruce Ferstein, who's part of my brain trust, I sent him the script early on just to get some feedback, and he wrote back some very encouraging things to me. He came up with the description of the character of Wes that was so spot-on. I used it in casting and describing it to everyone just what I was looking for, and the phrase that Bruce came up with was in casting the role of Wes, 'you need someone who has that special combination of arrogance and failure', which is exactly how to describe this character. The arrogance of ineptitude which so informs every movement of his is something I find completely delicious." -Jonathan Kaufer, director, DVD commentary

(Saul Rubinek On David:)
• "I had a lot of trouble not breaking up with David Strathairn. He was so funny, and we're both sometimes on the verge of it, and I was glad it didn't show. And what it did is it gave an extra energy to the scene, because I felt we were such fools--these two. They were so full of themselves, each with their own idea of what it takes to be a better man and what it takes to prove that they're smart and that they're together and mature and in control of their lives. Neither of them are." -Saul Rubinek, co-star (Matt), DVD commentary

• "When you want an ambiguous truth, when you want the audience to bring their own truth to a scene, sometimes it makes the direction a little oblique. And I know David, on a couple occasions, felt that I wasn't being specific enough in my direction with him, and it was very frustrating for me because I couldn't be more specific. I had to, at several points, tell the actors, 'Just play it down the middle' because, you know, both explanations could be true." -Jonathan Kaufer, director, DVD commentary

• "The real issue in this movie is did she [Kim, Caroleen Feeney's character] or didn't she have sex with David Strathairn's character. Now, what was really interesting about that was every single one of us, as actors, had a different opinion about whether she had or hadn't had sex. And what was interesting is you couldn't play that down the middle. So that when the actors all spoke to each other about this and said, 'Well, what are we supposed to do?' and we all decided we were going to play our own truths. We weren't going to play it down the middle... We all had the same theory about method. The method that we were going to play was we were just going to play our own truths. We weren't going to play anything ambiguously. We were going to play our own truths and hoped that what would happen, given the fact that we all had four different opinions...that it would end up looking down the middle. And it does." -Saul Rubinek, co-star (Matt), DVD commentary

• "There's a point here where David and I almost come to blows, and we did actually laugh so hard at each of our cockadoodledoo preening about to come to blows--neither of them have the guts to do it--that we held up shooting for about ten minutes... We broke up so badly we had to hold up shooting. We just couldn't play the moment. But it doesn't show here. We just laughed our asses off." -Saul Rubinek, co-star (Matt), DVD commentary