The Toy

The Toy would improve with a little tinkering. Still, it's surefire family fare. [10 Dec 1982, p.23]

Played straight, this could make some quite serious points about the predicament of the unemployed (Pryor as prostitute), but the film finds it easier to opt for cheap laughs. Read full review

The Toy, starring Richard Pryor, is a coarsened American remake of a deft French comedy of the same title, which starred Pierre Richard and passed this way five or six years ago. Fluctuating wildly between facetiousness and solicitude, the new version never comes close to reproducing the sane, lightweight charms of the original. Read full review

Two energetic and wonderfully physical comedians, each among the best of his generation. But in their movie, The Toy, they do not amount to much. Pryor seems unhappy about some of his lines and situations, and well he might. It's hard to know just what Gleason thinks, as he is able to deliver even atrocious dialogue with a misanthropic zest that is always appealing, but he has a right to be embarrassed, too. [20 Dec 1982, p.B7]

A dreadful remake of the French farce LE JOUET (1976), THE TOY is poorly written, over-directed, and filled with sophomoric attempts at humor. Only Richard Pryor's personal energy manages to save it from being complete rubbish. Read full review

My mind wasn't simply wandering during the film - it was ricocheting between the screen and the exit sign. Read full review

Comedy is no laughing matter; when a joke dies, the joker -- as well as the audience -- dies a little, too. At the end of Richard Pryor's latest comedy, The Toy, the viewer may require emergency medical attention. Shapeless, noisy, vulgar, sentimental and amateurish... [13 Dec 1982, p.83]

The plot makes the casting look inspired. More than inane, it's offensive. [14 Dec 1982]