‘The Luckiest Man in America’ Review: Paul Walter Hauser Plays an Infamous ‘Press Your Luck’ Contestant in an Unfortunate Misfire
variety.comStephen Saito A clip of the real “Press Your Luck” episode from 1984 that inspired “The Luckiest Man in America” accompanies the end credits, taken from the mid-show banter between contestant Michael Larson and Peter Tomarken.
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.
It’s good enough to fill 45 seconds of air time, but it’s hard to see what director Samir Oliveros did in making it the backbone of a 90-minute film covering Larson’s infamous appearance on the game show.
If Larson is remembered now, it’s for the fact that he won $110,000 on the show by memorizing the algorithm of the game’s Big Board to maximize his prize potential, and Oliveros is admirably more intrigued by why he did it than how.
Read more on variety.com