Film Forum

JACK LEMMON 100

Friday, May 16 – Thursday, May 29

“HAPPINESS IS WORKING WITH JACK LEMMON.”
– Billy Wilder

A two-week festival of classics from the 1950s to the 1990s in commemoration of Lemmon’s centennial year in 2025. The festival will include Lemmon’s best-known movies, including SOME LIKE IT HOT, DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES, THE ODD COUPLE, IRMA LA DOUCE, THE CHINA SYNDROME and a new 4K restoration of THE APARTMENT.

One of the most beloved actors in movie history, with a 50-year career that included comedies, musicals and dramas, Jack Lemmon (1925-2001), known for his quintessential “every man” persona, became the first person to win Academy Awards for both for his role in MISTER ROBERTS (Best Supporting Actor) and for SAVE THE TIGER (Best Actor). Lemmon also received Oscar nominations for THE CHINA SYNDROME (1979), TRIBUTE (1980) and MISSING (1982).

A frequent collaborator of director Billy Wilder and actor Walter Matthau, Lemmon first worked with Wilder on the comedy masterpiece SOME LIKE IT HOT (1959), shortly followed by the Oscar-winning THE APARTMENT (1960). He first starred opposite Matthau in THE FORTUNE COOKIE (1966), but it was their iconic clashing of personalities in THE ODD COUPLE (1968) that cemented their place as one of the all-time great comedy teams, with The New York Times dubbing them "one of Hollywood's most successful pairings."

Special guests during the festival will include Chris Lemmon (Jack's son), author of A Twist of Lemmon: A Tribute to My Father; Gina Raymond, (Jack’s daughter-in-law); television and stage actress Sydney Lemmon (Jack's granddaughter) (Succession, Job); Courtney Lemmon (Jack’s daughter); Courtney’s husband Peter McCrea (son of film stars Joel McCrea and Frances Dee); actor Juliet Mills, who co-starred with Jack in Billy Wilder’s AVANTI!; and actor Bob Odenkirk, a Lemmon fan who’s currently appearing on Broadway in the revival of David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross.