Rich and Famous

Rich and Famous follows two college friends whose lives take opposite directions. Liz Hamilton pursues a serious literary career and earns recognition from critics, while Merry Noel Blake marries and settles into domestic life, eventually writing popular novels about her wealthy and frivolous neighbours that become best-sellers. When the two women meet again after years apart, their reunion brings out how much each has changed and sets their differing ambitions against each other.

The film was directed by George Cukor, the seventeenth of the seventeen features he directed in chronological order, following My Fair Lady. Gerald Ayres wrote the screenplay, and Jacqueline Bisset, who plays Liz, produced with William Allyn. The cast includes Candice Bergen as Merry Noel, David Selby, Hart Bochner, Steven Hill and Meg Ryan in an early role. It runs 115 minutes.

Released in September 1981, the drama was made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer with a budget of about 12 million dollars and took roughly 14 million dollars worldwide, a modest return. On IMDb it holds 5.8 out of 10 from about 2,300 votes, and on TMDB 5.4 from a small number of votes. A critics' rating of 5.2 from 15 reviews places it below the audience score on IMDb.