Search The Archive

Search the film archive

Shampoo offers an unrivalled collection of stars: produced by Warren Beatty, directed by Hal Ashby and co-scripted by Beatty and Robert Towne. It features Beatty, Julie Christie, Goldie Hawn and Jack Warden.

The film is set in Beverley Hills on Election Eve, November 4, 1968, as Nixon is about to come to power in Washington. George (Warren Beatty) is a high-class hairdresser who is involved in several affairs with his clients. He lives with Jill (Goldie Hawn), has an intimate relationship with Felicia, who's the wife of tycoon Lester, and would like to resume with Lester's mistress, Jackie (Julie Christie). At the same time he becomes sexually involved with Felicia's daughter, Lorna. George has promised Jill that they'll settle down as soon as he gets his own shop, and he tries to raise the money from Lester.

The film follows through George's activities throughout election day and night, watching the results come in at a party at the Bistro, and acknowledging Nixon's victory at another party while dawn breaks. This celebration is set in a luxurious private home: an orgiastic gathering of tripped-out freaks, nude swimmers and heavy rock addicts. But it's at the first party — with its Nixon posters, colour TV's, patriotic speeches and conversations of off-shore oil drilling — that George's personal life starts to come undone . . .