Storyline: Jerry Ryan is aimlessly roaming New York after giving up his law career in Nebraska due to his wife seeking a divorce. He encounters Gittel Mosca, a struggling dancer from Greenwich Village, and together they attempt to get their lives back on track.
Top Billing Cast: Shirley MacLaine as Gittel 'Mosca' Moscawitz Robert Mitchum as Jerry Ryan Ann Morgan Guilbert as Molly - Dance Student's Mother Harold Gould as Bit
Shirley MacLaine and Robert Mitchum had a romantic relationship that lasted several years while they were filming together.
The movie, which was adapted from the Broadway play "Two for the Seesaw," originally starred Anne Bancroft and Henry Fonda as the only two characters. However, the film version expanded the cast.
Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman were initially set to star in the movie, but Taylor fell ill during the filming of Cleopatra (1963), allowing Newman to take the lead role in The Hustler (1961) instead.
In a 1969 interview with Roger Ebert, Robert Mitchum gave a drunken promotion for Ryan's Daughter (1970) and expressed his negative views about the director, Robert Wise. Mitchum said, "Bobby even times a kiss with a stopwatch. He marks out the floor at seven o'clock in the morning, before anybody gets there. Lays it all out with a tape measure. True. It's very difficult to work that way. I worked with him and Shirley MacLaine and Shirley said, 'Why doesn't he go home? He's just in the way...' "
The play "Two for the Seesaw" by William Gibson made its Broadway debut at the Booth Theater in New York on January 16, 1958 and was a hit, running for 750 performances and earning a Tony Award nomination for Best Play.
The film rights to the Broadway play were purchased by the Mirisch Co. for $350,000, as per the request of Elizabeth Taylor, who wanted to play the lead. However, due to her involvement in Cleopatra (1963), she was unable to take on the role.
