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MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT (1959): PADDY CHAYEVSKY fans: have you seen it?  This is the story of a lonely widower 56 year old businessman, FREDRIC MARCH, who begins an affair with his 24 year old office receptionist, KIM NOVAK, falls in love with her, becomes engaged, and the hostile response of both their families.  Restrained as necessary for 1959, CHAYEVSKY's screenplay is magnificent, candid and mature; these characters may not understand themselves or their troubles, but we do.  The screenplay reveals... well, all.  Though there are one or two moments of contrived stagy symbolism (MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT was first a TV show then expanded to a stage play starring 26 year old GENA ROWLANDS opposite EDWARD G. ROBINSON - imagine that??) this film was just riveting. 

I had thought FREDRIC MARCH's greatest performance was in INHERIT THE WIND, but the performance he gives in  MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT, impossibly, surpasses even that portrayal.  We see all facets of emotion and passion, from giddy lovesickness, to agonizing despair to creeping jealousy... WOW. 

I enjoy several of KIM NOVAK's films, a couple are favorites, and always enjoy watching her; her great beauty, and the often sexy nature of roles she took, made me underrate her acting until I sat through MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT.  She was really quite effective. 

Eerily relevant ALBERT DEKKER (best known to genre film fans for DR. CYCLOPS) in a small but key role, illustrates the worst case scenario: a man who knows his lecherous drunken philandering merely masks but does not fill the yawning hole at the center of his life, and being in a PADDY CHAYEVSKY screenplay, verbalizes it marvelously. 

Other faces I recognized were MARTIN BALSAM and LEE GRANT, both grappling with their own troubled marriages and bitterness.  Yep, this one gets very tough, remarkably moving, that by the end I saw myriad resolutions but was unconsciously begging for the one they chose.   :thumbup: 

Has anyone see this flick?  Saw it this afternoon on TCM.  So glad I checked it out (it was the live shots of 1959 New York streets that open the film that grabbed me) I have only seen it once, so would feel foolish attempting to describe that it was also interestingly and beautifully shot, staged, and framed. 

I don't know that I count as a Paddy fan per se, but I certainly enjoyed his "institutional" black comedies THE HOSPITAL and NETWORK.  This sounds more like a straightforward drama, not my favorite genre by a long stretch, but of course you have to love anything if it's well done. To answer your question I haven't seen it;I'd probably catch it if I happened to be watching TV and noticed it was on.