TRADING PLACES

As Dan Aykroyd, Eddie Murphy and Jamie Lee Curtis' status-switch comedy turns 40, director John Landis reflects on the film's rocky production and controversial legacy....

- SIMON BLAND

I got away with stuff mainly because I just did it,’ says filmmaking icon John Landis of Trading Places, his stock-market switch-up that has since become an unlikely Christmas staple despite going against studio casting demands and including scenes that haven’t aged well.

Landis’ comedy - about wealthy banker Louis Winthorpe III swapping social status with street hustler Billy Ray Valentine thanks to a cruel bet made by two commodity broker brothers, Randolph and Mortimer Duke-became the fourth highest-grossing film at the 1983 box office. Four decades on, it’s still largely beloved as a festive favourite but one that’s earned some controversial added interest following initial audience investment.

‘The picture was written by Timothy Harris and Herschel Weingrod for Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor,’ Landis tells Buff. Before the project had time to progress, a drug-addicted Pryor accidentally set himself on fire in 1980, forcing things to a standstill. However, Landis’ interest had been piqued. ‘I got excited because it was so old-fashioned,’ he explains. ‘It very much reminded me of the social comedies, often called “screwball”, of the 1930s. They all dealt with class and were all very funny. Ronald Reagan was president at the time with the whole “greed is good” philosophy. I thought: “If I pull this off, I can make a really old-fashioned, social-screwball comedy and no one will notice.”’