A Big Hand for the Little Lady

A Big Hand for the Little Lady
Directed by	Fielder Cook
Produced by	Fielder Cook
Written by	Sidney Carroll
Starring	Henry Fonda Joanne Woodward Paul Ford Jason Robards Burgess Meredith Charles Bickford Kevin McCarthy
Music by	David Raskin
Cinematography	Lee Garmes
Distributed by	Warner Bros. Pictures
Release date(s)	May 31, 1966 (1966-05-31)
Running time	95 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

A Big Hand for the Little Lady (released in the UK as Big Deal at Dodge City) is a 1966 western film, made by Eden Productions Inc. and released by Warner Bros. The movie was produced and directed by Fielder Cook from a screenplay by Sidney Carroll, adapted from their TV play Big Deal in Laredo which aired on the DuPont Show of the Week in 1962.

The film stars Henry Fonda, Joanne Woodward, Paul Ford, and Jason Robards, with Charles Bickford, Burgess Meredith, Kevin McCarthy, Robert Middleton, and John Qualen. The original TV play starred Walter Matthau as Meredith.

Plot

The five richest men in the territory gather in Laredo for their annual high-stakes poker game. The high rollers let nothing get in the way of their yearly showdown. When undertaker Tropp calls for them in his horse-drawn hearse, cattleman Henry Drummond forces a postponement of his daughter's wedding, while lawyer Otto Habershaw abandons his closing arguments in a trial, with his client's life hanging in the balance. They are joined by Wilcox and Buford in the back room of Sam's saloon, while the curious gather outside for occasional reports.

Settlers Meredith, his wife Mary, and their young son Jackie are passing through, on their way to purchase a farm near San Antonio, when a wheel on their wagon breaks. They wait at Sam's while the local blacksmith repairs it. Meredith, a recovering gambler, learns of the big poker game and begins to feel the excitement once again. During a break, Otto Habershaw, catches a glimpse of Mary in her violet dress. Being so enchanted by her, he permits Meredith's request to watch the game only if Mary allows him. The newcomer buys into the game, eventually staking all of the family savings, meant to pay for a home.

The game builds to a climactic hand; the gamblers raise and re-raise until more than $20,000 is in the pot. Meredith, out of cash, is unable to call the latest raise. Under the strain, he collapses. The town physician, Joseph "Doc" Scully, is called to care for the stricken man. Barely conscious, Meredith signals for his wife to play out the hand.

Taking his seat, Mary asks, "How do you play this game?" The other players object loudly to playing with someone who does not know the game, but eventually give in. The situation is explained to her: if she cannot match the last raise (and any others that may follow), she will be out of the hand.

Despite the men's protests, she leaves the room to borrow additional funds. With Jackie and four of the players trailing behind, Mary crosses the street and talks to the owner of the Cattle and Merchants' Bank, C. P. Ballinger. After she shows him her hand, Ballinger assumes she is playing a practical joke. When he learns otherwise, he loans her $5,500 (at 6% interest) and makes a $5,000 raise for her. The other players, aware of Ballinger's tightfisted, cautious nature, all reluctantly fold. Mary collects her sizable winnings and pays Ballinger back with interest. The game then breaks up, no one ever having seen the winning hand.

The lady's determination earns her the admiration of the men. Even Drummond, the most hard-hearted of the bunch, is so touched that, when he returns home to the waiting wedding ceremony, he talks privately to his weak-willed, prospective son-in-law, gives him some money, and orders him to run away and find himself a better wife than his daughter.

The denouement takes place in the gambling town of Black Creek, where it is revealed that Meredith, Mary, and even their "son" are confidence tricksters and expert card sharps. Together with Ballinger and Scully, they have perpetrated a scam on the five poker players, who had swindled the banker in a real estate deal sixteen years before. "Mary" is actually Ballinger's girlfriend Ruby. She had promised him she would give up gambling after the caper, but it becomes clear that she had no such intent when she sits down to another poker game.

Cast

• Henry Fonda as Meredith
• Joanne Woodward as Mary
• Jason Robards as Henry P.G. Drummond
• Paul Ford as C.P. Ballinger
• Charles Bickford as Benson Tropp
• Burgess Meredith as Doc Joseph Scully
• Kevin McCarthy as Otto Habershaw
• Robert Middleton as Dennis Wilcox
• John Qualen as Jesse Buford
• Jean-Michel Michenaud as Jackie
• James Berwick as Sam Rhine

Trivia

Freezing the frame during the scene where Mary pleads with Ballinger to finance her game on the basis of the hand shows that the cards she holds are two pair (fours and fives) and a queen.

Reception

Joanne Woodward was nominated for the Golden Laurel Award for Female Comedy Performance.^[1]

See also

• List of American films of 1966

References

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2008)

External links

• A Big Hand for the Little Lady at the Internet Movie Database
• A Big Hand for the Little Lady at AllRovi
• A Big Hand for the Little Lady at Rotten Tomatoes
• Original New York Times review