Lenny

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 88% based on 32 reviews. The critical consensus reads: "Dustin Hoffman inhabits Lenny Bruce with nervy energy in Bob Fosse's richly stylized telling of the pioneering comedian's career and downfall." On Metacritic, it has a score of 61 out of 100, based on 9 critic reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Pauline Kael for The New Yorker wrote that the film was "for audiences who want to believe that Lenny Bruce was a saintly gadfly who was martyred for having lived before their time" and mentions it's "well made" but complains that it takes itself so "insufferably seriously." Kael finishes with the acknowledgement that the movie is "black and white earnest" and that the "youth-culture saintliness laid on Lenny Bruce are the ultimate in modern showbiz sentimentality." One of the less enthusiastic reviews came from Roger Ebert, stating, "Unless we go in convinced that Lenny Bruce was an important performer, the movie doesn't convince us." In 2012, British film critic Mark Kermode put Hoffman's performance as Lenny Bruce at number eight in a top-ten video of Hoffman's best performances.