In Skin Deep, writer-director Blake Edwards explores some of the same themes he did in 10 and The Man Who Loved Women. John Ritter plays Zach, a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist whose creativity is sapped by a writer's block and all the energy he puts into philandering. His newscaster wife (Alyson Reed) leaves him when she catches him with his pants down with two of his squabbling conquests.

John Ritter makes the most out of the slapstick gags in Skin Deep. The best one involves condoms that glow in the dark. The women he seduces are representative of the fears and desires of his insecure male ego: among them are a body-builder type (Raye Hollit), a lady whose ire leads to fire (Julianne Phillips), and the battered girlfriend (Chelsea Ford) of a rock musician. Also good in supporting roles are Vincent Gardenia as a bartender friend, Michael Kidd as a droll therapist, Joel Brooks as a cynical lawyer, and Nina Foch as the worst mother-in-law imaginable.

Eventually Zach finds the inner will to conquer the self-destructive dimensions of his alcoholism and compulsive womanizing. Winning back his wife is a sweet reward.