FIVE EASY PIECES

Five Easy Pieces is a celebrated 1970 American road drama and character study from the New Hollywood era, directed by Bob Rafelson and starring Jack Nicholson in a career-defining role as Robert “Bobby” Dupea. The film is essentially about alienation and identity, focusing on Bobby, a highly gifted former classical piano prodigy from a wealthy, cultured family of musicians who has willfully rejected his privileged upbringing to live a chaotic, blue-collar existence as a restless oil rig worker in Southern California with his unsophisticated waitress girlfriend, Rayette (Karen Black). The plot centers on his reluctant journey back to his estranged, upper-class family’s isolated home in Washington state to visit his dying, stroke-afflicted father, a trip that forces him to confront his past, his sense of failure, and the fact that he feels like an outcast in both the intellectual world he fled and the working-class world he adopted. The film is famous for its dark humor, raw emotionality, and particularly for the unforgettable diner scene where Bobby’s frustration boils over into a confrontation with a waitress over ordering toast.