After successfully staging this Neil Simon musical on Broadway in the late 1960s, Fosse was given free reign as director and choreographer to bring it to the screen. This bittersweet musical, based on Fellini’s Nights of Cabiria, chronicles the exploits of the eternally hopeful Charity Hope Valentine (MacLaine), a dance-hall hostess who only wants to be loved but seldom meets with fortune in her relationships with men. Although a box-office failure in its time, Sweet Charity stands today as a highly enjoyable time capsule of the psychedelic sixties, replete with zealous use of the zoom lens, interludes of still images, and Sammy Davis, Jr. memorably singing-preaching the "Rhythm of Life."