Michael Jordon, an architect, accidentally becomes involved in a web of intrigue and murder when a strange woman, who enters a taxi with him, is later found murdered. As a result, he flees from false murder charges. Kate is a woman out to find her brother's killer. Although she and Michael initially believe the other is a killer, they realize otherwise and become a team. They undertake a wild cross-country ride from New York City to the Grand Canyon.
The film was developed as a follow-up to the successful Gene Wilder-Richard Pryor film Stir Crazy.[4] However, Pryor chose not to participate and Gilda Radner was brought in as a replacement, with the script rewritten for her role.[5]
Vincent Canby, writing in The New York Times, gave the film a mixed review, saying it "is apt to leave you far less exhilarated than exhausted."[7][8]
Richard Schickel wrote: "a funny, human moment, and if Hanky Panky had 30 or 40 more of them it might have been a congenial little picture"[9]
Variety wrote: "a limp romantic suspense comedy which manages to be neither romantic, suspenseful nor funny...appears to be an attempt to duplicate the classy thrills of North by Northwest..."[10]
Novelization
A $2.50 paperback novelization of the screenplay was published by Pinnacle Books, in July 1982 ,[11][12] by Leslie Jarreau, possibly a pseudonym. The book is copyrighted by, Henry Rosenbaum and David Taylor, the screenwriters.[13]
