"The clock is ticking away," says Eli Wurman (Al Pacino), a burnt-out PR agent in Manhattan who graduated from Harvard Law School but was lured by the glitz and the glory of hobnobbing with celebrities. He once worked with Montgomery Clift and Mama Cass but now is down to Cary Launer (Ryan O'Neal), a famous actor who is thinking about making a run for the U.S. Senate. Wurman begins a long night by attending a musical with the producers who are anxious about the critics' responses. Then, keeping himself going with a nasty mixture of pills and booze, he heads downtown to post bail for Launer's latest girlfriend, TV starlet Jilli (Tea Leoni). She takes him to an exclusive Wall Street party where opium is used. There Wurman is surprised to bump into billionaire Elliot Sharansky (Richard Schiff). Later at her hotel, he falls into a stupor induced by the tensions of the day and all the pills he's taken. In the morning, Jilli is found dead.
Dan Algrant directs this sophisticated drama that delves into the high-powered world of New York politics, media, and celebrityhood. The screenplay by Jon Robin Baitz hits the mark with its rounded and incisive portrait of the hectic life of a PR agent at the end of his rope. Al Pacino is convincing as a worn-out, depressed man who is full of regrets about the meaninglessness of his life. The self-esteem building project that has taken most of his energy is a gala benefit for some Nigerians who have been unjustly detained by the mayor in a Manhattan prison. Wurman takes a ride uptown and tries to convince Reverend Lyle Blunt (Bill Nunn), a charismatic Harlem minister, to attend the event and speak out for persecuted people of color. He also wants Sharansky to come, but this powerful civic leader has had several run-ins with the minister.
In the middle of the day, Wurman visits his doctor (Robert Klein), who is worried about the blood in his urine and his mixing of pills and booze. The agent is late for a lunch with Victoria Gray (Kim Basinger), the widow of his brother who committed suicide. She has come to the city in a valiant effort to persuade Wurman to give up his crazy life and return with her to Virginia. In a poignant scene she says that no one really knows what they're doing, everyone is just lurching from one thing to the next. Wurman, who once marched with Martin Luther King, Jr., is determined to make a difference with his fundraiser. His race against time is more onerous than he knows.
