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Sobieski's script all but ignores the humor- ous aspects of the char acter portrayed by Gleason. while over- loading Pryor's role with a lot of predict- That neither the Pryor-Gleason team, work nor the picture's plot developments measure up to what one might expect of them seems jointly the fault of screenwriter Carol Sobieski and director Richard Don- ner. Even the premise of a brattish hid, spoiled rotten by his multi, millionaire father. who chooses a person to be his newest "toy" holds out the prospects for some entertaining comic antics. The teaming of Rich- and Pryor land Jackie Gleason, both accom- plished comedians of obvious contrasting- character types, tam talizes the imagination with its potential for double the fun. tum, The Toy at the outset has a lot of "open me first" appeal - befitting its arrival at theatres a week in advance of the main openings of this year's gammy wrapped Hol- lywood goodies. Borrowing its title and some superficial aspects of its storyline trom a 1976 French Like many-present awaiting children under the Christmas Inc. the movie The stance. mildiy divert- ing and soon to be for Victor Stanton Chvon6cle Special The Toy. able and limeworn 3135. (That’s not to deny on: Pryor still manages to with: at least a chuckle from even as ancient a arcane: as the “walk this way" routine.) Teresa Gauzel plays the latest wife of a ruthless southern tycoon (Jackie Gleason) in The Toy. Pryor, portraying an out-oi-vork novelist (unimaginatively and Jack Brown) desperate hr any job that will help him pay the mortgage on his house, is admittedly very good, often in this movie sustaining com- no lasting effect Ody scenes that other wise would be totally without amusement. He even manages to Inject a surprising amount of sincerity into sequences In which "drama" is ladled out like Christmas pud- enthralling Gleason, playing a Louisiana tycoon named U.S. Bates - a name chosen to set up two obvious and ex- ceedingly juvenile jokes, one involving the drawledmut pronoun- ciation of his initials and the other in in- troducing his son - rarely gets the chance to function as even a good second banana. "Watching The Toy is a harmless enough ex- perience that is period- ically amusing but never satisfactorily ding, complete with a cloytng musical sauce. Despite the fact that The Toy in this Ameri- canized version has been written by a woman, female char- acters merely repre- sent a cross-section of long-established screen stereotypes. On display - in every sense of the word - as the picture's most dominant actress is Teresa Ganzel, doing the squeaky-voiced, big-busted, dumb- blonde routine in the thankless role of Bates's third wife. As the Bates kid, whose character is ac- tually a little nicer than it should be, young screen newcomer Scott Schwartz creates a tte- lievable chemistry with Pryor. There also are some good, all-too-brief, comedy turns by water an English actor Wil- frid Hyde-White, as a cocktail-sipping butler Bates won in a billiards game, and Ned Beatty, as Bates's exer- obedient employee. ”£78100 12MrttDtttAE, tfrettoAVntEdl+t IS. "" .---PME " E==iGeriCCita Ce.9.,Lr?LreIqyi.._aI-a-argrmte.. _Hot Buffet VARIOUS HOT DISHES UP TO 30 SELECTIONS