Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid "Bonnie and Clyde. ..." we don't believe it, and we walk out of the theater wondering what happened to that great movie we were seeing until an hour ago." The Writers Guild of America ranked the screenplay #11 on its list of 101 Greatest Screenplays ever written. Over time, major American movie reviewers have been widely favorable. Rotten Tomatoes, a film review aggregator, gives 89% "Certified fresh" favorable score based on 46 reviews with an average score of 8.2/10, the site's critical consensus reads With its iconic pairing of Paul Newman and Robert Redford, jaunty screenplay and Burt Bacharach score,
Jack Lemmon a recovering alcoholic. Lemmon's production company JML produced "Cool Hand Luke" in 1967. Paul Newman was grateful to Lemmon for his support and offered him the role of the Sundance Kid, later played by Robert Redford in "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid", but Lemmon turned it down. He did not like riding horses and he felt he'd already played too many aspects of the Sundance Kid's character before. Lemmon appeared in many films partnered with actor Walter Matthau. Among their pairings was 1968's "The Odd Couple", as Felix Ungar (Lemmon) and Oscar Madison (Matthau). The first film they starred