The King of Comedy (film) character fails to differentiate between his fantasies and reality in much the same way. Scorsese sought to achieve the same with the film so that, in his words, the "fantasy is more real than reality". Rupert Pupkin has been compared to Travis Bickle in "Taxi Driver": both characters have serious issues with reality testing, that is drawing the line between outer objective and inner subjective reality. In her review, entertainment columnist Marilyn Beck approved Johnny Carson's refusal to participate in "The King of Comedy", supposedly because he feared the film could inspire psychopaths like John Hinckley. Beck considered "The King
The Gambler (1974 film) Freed, although obviously different from the character De Niro would have created," wrote Toback later. It was filmed at a time when leading actor James Caan was battling his own addiction to cocaine. Caan says the film is one of his favorites. "It's not easy to make people care about a guy who steals from his mother to pay gambling debts." Some see the film as a loose adaptation of the short novel "The Gambler" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. In August 2011, Paramount Pictures announced a remake of the 1974 film "The Gambler" with the original producers, Irwin Winkler and Robert