Trailer
Plot summary
Harvey Pekar works as a file clerk at a VA hospital in Cleveland, where the talk among his co-workers ranges from music to jellybeans. At home he reads, writes and listens to jazz, and his apartment holds books and LPs. He hunts Cleveland's thrift stores and garage sales for books and records, savoring a 25-cent find. At a junk sale he meets Robert Crumb, an illustrator of greeting cards who shares his taste in jazz and comics. After Crumb's underground comics find international success, Harvey starts writing comics drawn from his own working-class life.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about American Splendor (2003)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- David Letterman refused to appear in American Splendor, and NBC would not let the filmmakers use footage of Harvey Pekar's disastrous fourth and sixth Late Night appearances, so his supposed "final appearance" was recreated with oblique camera angles and voiced-over audio.
- Before the film was made, Harvey Pekar and Joyce Brabner had already been approached by actors wanting to play Pekar on screen, among them Rob Schneider.
- Co-writer and co-director Robert Pulcini said having actors and the real Harvey Pekar share the film was the only way to tell the story, because the main character of the comics never looked the same, drawn by so many different artists.
- American Splendor was the first narrative feature for Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, who had directed only documentaries beforehand.
