The Toy

The Toy (1982) is an American comedy directed by Richard Donner — watch online on iFILM. A broke journalist agrees to be purchased as a literal toy for the spoiled son of a Louisiana tycoon played by Jackie Gleason. Richard Pryor is the man who gets treated like a household appliance, at first jumping through every humiliating hoop the kid invents.

What starts as a string of gags about money and power slowly shifts into something warmer. The boy is lonely in the way that only extremely rich children can be — surrounded by everything, close to nobody. Pryor brings his usual edge to a role that could have gone pure slapstick, and Donner keeps enough bite in the comedy that it does not curdle into sentiment. Stream The Toy (1982) online on iFILM.