"In a career that spanned almost 50 years Jack Lemmon was seldom a soothing presence. Sweaty, stammering and hyperactive, Lemmon seemed to embody the countertype of the monumental, granite-jawed leading men of the 1950s — stars like John Wayne, Robert Mitchum and Gregory Peck.

"Where Peck, for example, seemed to embody the World War II squadron leader slipping into middle age and forced to operate on the unfamiliar corporate battlefields of Madison Avenue (“The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit”), Lemmon was the junior officer eagerly polishing the brass of his superiors (in his Oscar-winning supporting performance in “Mister Roberts”), a tactic he queasily carried with him into the business world (“The Apartment”). Lemmon’s recurring predicament is that of the desperate conformist who ultimately discovers that conformity comes at too high a price."

—Dave Kehr in his NY Times article, "Everyman, Tempted" about a new Jack Lemmon DVD collection

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