Desperately Seeking Susan

Desperately Seeking Susan
Poster for the film, featuring a photograph by Herb Ritts
Directed by	Susan Seidelman
Written by	Leora Barish
Produced by	Sarah Pillsbury Midge Sanford
Starring	Rosanna Arquette Madonna Aidan Quinn
Cinematography	Edward Lachman
Edited by	Andrew Mondshein
Music by	Thomas Newman
Distributed by	Orion Pictures
Release dates	March 29, 1985 U.S. release
Running time	104 min.
Language	English
Budget	$4,500,000 (estimated)

Desperately Seeking Susan is a 1985 film directed by Susan Seidelman and starring Rosanna Arquette and Madonna.

Arquette plays Roberta, a bored housewife living in Fort Lee, New Jersey who is fascinated with a woman she only knows about by reading messages to and from her in the personals section of a New York City tabloid. This fascination reaches a peak when one such ad with the headline "Desperately Seeking Susan" proposes a rendezvous in Battery Park with the man who seeks her. Roberta goes to Battery Park too, and gets a glimpse of the woman, played by Madonna, whose life so fascinates her. In a series of events involving mistaken identity, amnesia, and other farcical elements Roberta goes from voyeur to participant in an Alice in Wonderland-style plot, ostensibly motivated by the search for a pair of stolen earrings.

The film captures the feel of a certain underground scene of mid-1980s in New York City, a scene that in real life helped Madonna get her big break in the music business.

Madonna's role in the film remains one of her most acclaimed, which reinforces the popular notion among critics that Madonna is only skilled at playing a character whose personality is similar to her own.

Awards

Arquette won a BAFTA Award for her portrayal of Roberta; the fact that the award was for a "supporting role" reflected the surge in popularity that Madonna was experiencing at the time, since in terms of billing, number of scenes, lines of dialog, and plot Arquette was actually the film's star.

The film also received a nomination for a César Award for Best Foreign Film.

Trivia

• The poster for the film features a photograph by Herb Ritts.
• The DVD commentary track for the film (recorded in 1996) noted that after Madonna's first screen test, the producers asked her to take four weeks of acting lessons and get screen-tested again. Although the second screen test wasn't much of an improvement, the director still wanted her for the role, as much for her presence and sense of style as for anything else.
• Some of the scenes were filmed in Danceteria, a club that Madonna frequented and which gave her her start.
• The film was inspired in part by the 1974 film Céline et Julie vont en bateau (Céline and Julie Go Boating).

Cast

Actor/Actress	Role
Rosanna Arquette	Roberta Glass
Madonna	Susan
Aidan Quinn	Dez
Mark Blum	Gary Glass, Roberta's husband
Robert Joy	Jim (the man who placed the "Desperately Seeking Susan" ad)
Laurie Metcalf	Leslie Glass, Roberta's sister-in-law
Anna Levine	Crystal
Will Patton	Wayne Nolan
Peter Maloney	Ian the magician
Steven Wright	Larry Stillman D.D.S.
John Turturro	Ray, the master of ceremonies at the Magic Club
Anne Carlisle	Victoria
José Angel Santana	Boutique Owner
Giancarlo Esposito	Street Vendor
Richard Hell	Bruce Meeker
Ann Magnuson	Cigarette Girl
Michael Bramon	Band Member