Jazz Singer, The

Musical

Neil Diamond	Yussel Rabinowitz
Laurence Olivier	Cantor Rabinowitz
Lucie Arnaz	Molly Bell
Catlin Adams	Rivka Rabinovitch
Franklyn Ajaye	Bubba
Paul Nicholas	Keith Lennox
Sully Boyar	Eddie Gibbs
Mike Kellin	Leo
James Booth	Paul Rossini
Janet Brandt	Aunt Tillie
Dale Robinette
Michael Pasternak

Director	Richard Fleischer
Producer	Jerry Leider
Writer	Herbert Baker; Stephen H. Foreman; Samson Raphaelson

Not much jazz spoken in this 1980 version of the Jolson classic, directed by Richard Fleischer (The Vikings) and starring a very tentative Neil Diamond as a cantor's son who would rather sing commercially than in a synagogue. The soundtrack is tedious, the portrait of L.A.'s music industry preposterous, and Diamond (despite his talents as a singer-songwriter in the real world) can't help but look like a speck on the wall in the presence of Laurence Olivier, who plays his father. --Tom Keogh