Debuting on Cinemax, it would be easy to shrug off this Playboy production as erotic thriller filler. After chatting to scripter Dode Levenson, though, Dave finds out that things could have been very different indeed…

The journey of MUTUAL NEEDS (1997) is a fascinating one. To say the film had a near decade-long path to the screen might be reaching, but it’s interesting to think that its genesis began in the bowels of Texas in August 1989, with a suited Dennis Hopper yelling “action!”.

Steve Ujlaki graduated from Harvard University in 1965 and cut his teeth in the business working alongside Jean-Luc Godard. With a passion for promoting world cinema, Ujlaki found that he was able to dovetail his lecturing work as a film professor with a producing career, kicking it off with a version of Heidi called Courage Mountain (1990) and starring Charlie Sheen. Memorable ventures followed – like the family friendly Loch Ness (1996) and the Rutger Hauer serial killer flick Bone Daddy (1998) – but his standout work was unquestionably The Hot Spot (1990).

A sumptuously sweaty neo-noir with career best performances from Don Johnson and Virginia Madsen, Hopper’s film is a glorious adaptation of Hell Hath No Fury, Charles Williams’ pulp novel from 1953. Stung by Johnson who asserted that he was too busy to promote it, The Hot Spot tanked at the box office. Undeterred, Ujlaki decided to return to the duplicitous themes of noir a few years later and hired a young and ambitious screenwriter to make it happen.

“Well, as with most things in my career, all roads usually lead to Larry Kuppin,” chuckles scripter Dode Levenson. “He owned New World Pictures and he was instrumental in giving me every break that I could ask for. He was patient with me too. More patient than he should be. After all, I was a young kid, full of piss and vinegar, and I got schooled by him.”

“Larry recommended me to Steve Ujlaki, who I believe was teaching film at the time. Steve was the guy who was key in getting Mutual Needs off the ground, and why he’s not credited somewhere on the film I do not know. We developed the script together in approximately 1994, and he’s the real producer of the movie. One of the reasons that I was so excited to do this picture is because Steve produced one of my favourite film noirs, The Hot Spot. It’s SO good. It’s like a play. I revisited it the other day and it absolutely holds up.”

Both Levenson’s love for Ujlaki’s earlier opus and the producer’s own affection for his unheralded masterpiece run right through the spine of Mutual Needs. The film centres around Michael (Eric Scott Woods), a middle manager at an unexceptional accountancy firm who’s just been dumped by his girlfriend. With a ten year class reunion only days away, Michael is aghast at the prospect of arriving there as a singleton with minimal career progression, so he hires Charlene (Rochelle Swanson): a high class call girl who’s all too happy to facilitate a fanciful façade for her client. Charlene, though, was a budding actress whose career in Hollywood was cut short by a long line of execs who failed to recognise her ability. Now she’s out for revenge against the opposite sex. Be it Michael or his high-flying former classmate, Brandon (Richard Grieco) – her desire to extort and  discredit will take her victims to the brink of hell.

“A high school reunion is such a nice premise for a film,” says Levenson. “You can go comedy. You can go thriller. You can go lots of different ways. But I thought that this concept was ripe for picking. I loved the idea of a guy who’s insecure but fancies the idea of going back to his reunion and being cock of the roost. I think we can all relate to that [laughs]. Twenty or thirty years down the line, and people care a lot less about what you’ve done. Ten years? Well, you still have something to prove.”

It’s that need to impress his peers that reveals the stroke of genius in casting Mutual Needs. Woods is perfect, ably showcasing naivety and stupidity in his quest to conjure envy from his former friends. Swanson, too, is a revelation. Already a video store icon thanks to roles in Night Fire (1994), Illicit Dreams (1994) and Sorceress (1995), the T&A staple fits Leveson’s Madsen-shaped template perfectly. Grieco, on the other hand, despite his top billing, is seldom seen.

“I would have switched around Grieco and Wood, you know!” declares Levenson. “He’s great as the foil, but I could have done with someone with a bigger profile in the lead. Grieco is so good looking after all. Whether he’s a good actor or a bad actor, you certainly can’t take your eyes off him. A poor man’s Mickey Rourke. And obviously I would have cast Virginia Madsen any day of the week [laughs].”

Irrespective of the best intentions for Mutual Needs, Ujlaki’s lack of theatrical success with The Hot Spot and Loch Ness meant that his and Levenson’s project was a tough sell. It was eventually bankrolled by Playboy in 1997. Robert Angelo was recruited to direct and Levenson’s script was redrafted by George Ayvas. Both Angelo and Ayvas had spent a few years at the helm of Showtime’s Beverly Hills Bordello anthology, so were well versed in what the bunny expected.

For Levenson, a Cinemax premiere in February ’99 felt like a crushing disappointment considering where he and Ujlaki began.

“We had greater ambitions and were desperate to recreate the vibe of The Hot Spot for the attention of a studio. That was my goal, and it’s also what my script did. Some scenes in the final film had such poor production values that it made me want to cry. But you know Hollywood. At some point the investor wants his money back. I’ll be honest though: they did leave a good chunk of my script in the film despite me not collaborating with them.”

“I write a screenplay, but often what comes out of the camera is a combination of the vision of the director and the expectation of the distributor. I had a director shrug at me once and say, ‘But it’s only a B-movie.’ I don’t subscribe to that theory. You may have a B-movie budget, but there’s nothing that should stop you from having the ambition to make a first class feature.”