upper-cruster

Out of disguise, the masked outlaw who duels with a grin and woos with ardor, morphs into blasé upper-cruster Don Diego Vega, who suffers from overrefinement and chronic fatigue.

The highest-grossing French-language film of all time, The Intouchables sparked a mini-firestorm when it opened stateside, its comforting tale of a staid white upper-cruster learning What’s Really Important from a disadvantaged black service worker inviting comparisons to The Help, which also premiered that year.

If the notion of a smooth-talking black man insinuating himself into the life of a Manhattan upper-cruster strikes a familiar note, you are probably recalling John Guare’s “Six Degrees of Separation,” which may well have been an inspiration for Mr. Gurney’s play.

Hollywood veterans Don Ameche and Ralph Bellamy are superb as the Duke brothers: sinister, ageing millionaires who have a bet going that any lowlife, given enough cash and the good things in life, can pass for a member of America's higher echelons, and conversely that an upper-cruster will collapse when faced with financial adversity.

Mr. Connell oozes self-mocking charm as the slumming upper-cruster, while Mr. Bellamy exudes a funny torpor as the nearly sleepwalking Arnold.