Insignificance

Described by Nicolas Roeg as a "melodramatic farce that's both real and mythical," this film brings together four iconic figures of the 1950s for one turbulent night in a New York hotel room—a night during which their identities are explored, questioned, and exchanged. The characters are never named, only referred to as the Actress (Theresa Russell), the Professor, the Senator, and the Ballplayer. But their real-life inspirations are unmistakable: Hollywood sex symbol Marilyn Monroe; the father of relativity, Albert Einstein; Senator Joseph McCarthy, infamous for his anti-communist witch hunts; and Monroe's then-husband, baseball legend Joe DiMaggio. From the collision of these Cold Ware-era icons, Roeg weaves an intellectual vaudeville and a layered meditation of fame, myth-making, and the fleeting nature of it all. In the film's funniest scene, Theresa Russell uses children's toys on the carpet to give a playful demonstration of Einstein's most famous equation.