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What a difference a few years make. Warren Spector couldn’t have looked less like a banker had he tried at the showing of A Bird of the Air– his first movie as an executive producer since being ousted from Bear Stearns in 2007 before the bank failed. Dressed in a bright-yellow raincoat, the former co-president of Bear Stearns amicably chatted among the 50-odd audience that had come to see his debut production at the East Village movie theatre in Manhattan. The director of his film is his wife, actress Margaret Whitton, who starred in the 1980s films The Secret of my Success and 9-1/2 weeks.
Spector, now in movies and an unabashed Democrat, is more East Village than Wall Street these days, although certainly some of his former corporate America peers had come along to support him. It is not too often one overhears conversations in an East Village cinema discussing which Republican candidate to support financially. (‘As many as you can’ seemed to be the consensus.)
Spector had bombarded his contact book – clearly held over from his Bear days, as we were on it – with emails imploring friends to go and see the film.
‘If I’ve ever done you a favor, helped you out, made you money, got you a job, made a contribution to something important to you, or in any other way been a positive influence in your life, GO SEE THIS MOVIE,’ Spector wrote.
It made us wonder if he ever sold a CMBS or a CDO with such passion.
Spector was candid and relaxed about reviews of the film, which he said were "mixed". The romantic comedy follows the relationship between a kooky librarian and a nightshift roadside assistance worker.
The latter emerges from his solitary shell after a talking parrot arrives in his trailer. Euromoney rating: triple-B–.