A bold and unusual choice for Newman's debut, based on the novel 'A Jest of God' by Margaret Laurence. It comes over as very European, Bergmanesque, ahead of its time. Joanne Woodward is of course fantastic as a confused, becalmed woman who just needs to get away and find something new in her life (away from her mother, preferably).
He is wonderfully supported of course by Dede Allen (they would have met on The Hustler) who magically helps unite her lives past and present (and imagined). Well, I say 'magically', but in fact it's an adroit mixture of sound and vision - editing, in fact. It's Robert Altman's Images, four years earlier.
Nell Potts as the younger version is indeed Joanne and Paul's daughter (one of them). With Estelle Parsons, James Olson, Kate Harrington (the mother), Donald Moffat. Music: Jerome Moross, photography: Gayne Rescher. Stewart Stern, who co-authored Rebel Without a Cause, wrote it, and was Oscar nominated, as were Woodward (Streisand and Hepburn K. tied), Parsons and Newman for Best Picture (he did win the Golden Globe for Best Director, and she for Dramatic Actress).
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