The Troublemaker

New Jersey chicken farmer Tom Aldredge moves to New York to open a coffee shop in Greenwich Village so that he can meet a wider variety of people. He hooks up with his college buddy Buck Henry, now a successful attorney. Henry tries to help him navigate the maze of corruption involved with opening a business in NY, but Aldredge refuses to have anything to do with corruption. Gangster James Frawley (who would go on to direct "The Muppet Movie"), fire inspector Godfrey Cambridge, and a whole bunch of other corrupt officials try to do him in.

Theodore J. Flicker, best known for directing "The President's Analyst" and co-creating "Barney Miller", directed and co-wrote (with Henry) this extremely weird farce. It feels very much like a dry run at "The President's Analyst", with an array of odd characters and strange, absurdist plot interruptions, as well as a plot involving a vast comic conspiracy. It's really not as good as that film ... about 40% of the jokes actually land ... but it's a fitfully amusing curiosity that feels like it should have been a cult item.

It's also mildly racy with Playboy Bunny China Lee (best known as the girl in the dancing wraparounds of "What's Up, Tiger Lily?") standing around in her underwear as Henry narrates the story from a massage parlor, and co-star Joan Darling (kind of the film's love interest) has a bunch of almost-nude scenes.