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‘The Luckiest Man in America’ Review: Paul Walter Hauser Plays an Infamous ‘Press Your Luck’ Contestant in an Unfortunate Misfire
Paul Walter Hauser stars as infamous 'Press Your Luck' winner Michael Larson in misfire ‘The Luckiest Man in America,’ which never finds its footing.
Larson has the kind of anecdotes that probably made a producer smile during a pre-interview, telling Tomarken about how he tried to make good with his daughter after missing her birthday and drove an ice cream truck the previous summer to supplement his income as an air conditioning repairman. Having Walton Goggins around as Tomarken, Haley Bennett as Larson’s wife Patricia, Maisie Williams as a studio tour guide and Patti Harrison and Brian Geraghty as his fellow contestants suggests this worked well enough on the page to attract such a strong ensemble, but less so in its ultimate execution, despite their best efforts. Cinematographer Pablo Lozano seizes on the dimmer lighting of old-fashioned bulbs in a pre-computerized era of game shows to instill a darkness to the proceedings, while production designer Lulú Salgado’s impressive re-creation of the “Press Your Luck” set and surrounding studio lot is made to feel simultaneously exciting and foreboding.
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