The very same year that this T.V. movie came out, one of the four actresses in it (Mildred Natwick) appeared in the short-lived Kander and Ebb musical "70, Girl, 70", proving that if you wanted to see old folks, you were in the wrong hall that night. Natwick, Myrna Loy, Helen Hayes and Sylvia Sidney are long-time friends with pranksterous natures who concoct all sorts of harmless schemes basically to distract them from their boring lives that consists of "tee many martuni's" and lunch pretty much every day that consists of two coffee's, two tea's and the same entree's for each of them. Having gone from prank to prank week after week and drink after drink, they now decide to try computer dating, posing as a single young lady and unfortunately attracting a psychopathic sadomasochist (Vince Edwards) who kills a prostitute, thinking it to be the young women these women invented, and then going after the four ladies after realizing how he was duped. "General Hospital's" chief of staff, John Beradino, becomes a police captain here, and his reactions to the feistiness of these delightful old ladies are priceless, especially one moment alone with Hayes who is just as delightfully lovable here as she was in the previous year's "Airport" for which she won an Oscar the year this TV movie originally aired.
Three of these stars (Loy and Hayes, at MGM, and Sidney, at Paramount) were major leading stars in the 1930's, and Natwick was a major Broadway leading lady until moving into film character roles. Each of them get distinctive personalities, with the raspy Sidney having an amusing drunk scene, the seemingly sober Hayes a delicious hung over scene, Loy the most sophsticated with her droll responses, and Natwick slightly eccentric. Even with an outlandish plot and a not so great script, it is the four ladies who makes a silk purse out of a sow's ear, leading to a series just 2 years later reuniting Hayes and Natwick ("The Snoop Sisters") that had them playing different characters with similar personalities. Edwards plays a rather creepy, perverted character with obvious violent tendencies, but it's obvious that he's no match for these four feisty senior citizens who might seem like cartoon characters with a tweetie bird, black cat and umbrella but can definitely take care of themselves. As Hayes says, "It certainly has been one hell of a day, hasn't it girls?"
Three of these stars (Loy and Hayes, at MGM, and Sidney, at Paramount) were major leading stars in the 1930's, and Natwick was a major Broadway leading lady until moving into film character roles. Each of them get distinctive personalities, with the raspy Sidney having an amusing drunk scene, the seemingly sober Hayes a delicious hung over scene, Loy the most sophsticated with her droll responses, and Natwick slightly eccentric. Even with an outlandish plot and a not so great script, it is the four ladies who makes a silk purse out of a sow's ear, leading to a series just 2 years later reuniting Hayes and Natwick ("The Snoop Sisters") that had them playing different characters with similar personalities. Edwards plays a rather creepy, perverted character with obvious violent tendencies, but it's obvious that he's no match for these four feisty senior citizens who might seem like cartoon characters with a tweetie bird, black cat and umbrella but can definitely take care of themselves. As Hayes says, "It certainly has been one hell of a day, hasn't it girls?"