Writer and Director Bob Rafelson has stated that this is the final part of an informal trilogy he started with Five Easy Pieces (1970) and continued with The King of Marvin Gardens (1972). In the three, Nicholson has now played son, brother, and father. In this one, Nicholson is a wealthy wine dealer who has distanced himself from his wife with his philandering, and from his son with his negligence. After he steals a diamond necklace with the help of a safecracker partner, Victor, things start coming apart. His wife sets out to interrupt what she thinks is another one of his weekend dalliances, but is really his trip to pawn the jewels.