The Saint in New York - Cultural References

Cultural References

A copy of the novel The Saint in New York was featured prominently in an episode of the Canadian sitcom Corner Gas in 2004. In the episode "Comedy Night", the show's lead character, Brent Leroy, attempts to sway a local ladies' reading club away from examining Oprah's Book Club-style titles like The Life of Pi and into adventure fiction such as Don Pendleton's The Executioner and The Saint in New York. Brent compares The Saint in New York's plot with the "fish out of water" plot of The Life of Pi. According to the book Tales from Dog River: The Complete Corner Gas Guide by Michele Sponagle, the show's prop department had to obtain multiple copies of the novel for filming, but found it difficult to do so since it is out of print; they had to order copies from as far away as Florida. (Ultimately, however, only one copy of the book actually appeared on screen, specifically the 1980s reprint edition by Charter Books.)

In the movie Inglourious Basterds, the character Shosanna Dreyfus can be seen reading The Saint in New York while sitting in a Paris café. The same book is present in a scene where Shosanna and her lover Marcel are planning to kill all the top Nazis in Chapter Five ("Revenge of the Giant Face").