Whereas the previous film Trail of the Pink Panther made use of unused footage of Sellers as Inspector Clouseau and starred Joanna Lumley as journalist Marie Jouvet, Curse attempted to relaunch the series with a new lead, Ted Wass, as inept American detective Clifton Sleigh, assigned to find the missing Inspector Clouseau.
Meanwhile, his former superior, Chief Inspector Charles Dreyfus, is pressured to oversee Operation Paragon and utilize Interpol's fictitious Huxley 600 computer Aldous to find the world's greatest detective to solve the crime.
Anxious never to see or hear from his nemesis Clouseau again, Dreyfus sabotages the computer to select the world's worst detective.
Dreyfus and his long-suffering assistant, Sergeant François Duval, soon find that the sabotage has worked a bit too well: while slightly more intelligent and capable, Sleigh is just as clumsy as Clouseau.
Ultimately, Langlois, along with his henchmen (including Mr. Chong from Revenge of the Pink Panther) have a final showdown with Sleigh in a dark alley in Valencia, Spain, during Carnival.
This leads Sleigh to conclude (albeit, incorrectly) that Clouseau stole the Pink Panther, had his face changed and then took the name Gino Rossi; and that he was a good cop gone bad who was killed for the diamond.
Out at sea in a boat it is revealed that Sir Charles Litton had stolen The Pink Panther diamond from Chandra and Roger Moore (who is heavily implied earlier to not actually be the real Roger Moore, but a very much-alive Clouseau, having indeed changed his face and identity for reasons unknown), claiming he was missing his phantom glove, while he, his wife Simone, and their nephew George share a toast.
After considering Rowan Atkinson and John Ritter for the role, Edwards cast Ted Wass after enjoying his performance in Soap.
[3] NYPD Lt. Palmyra would have continued as Sleigh's Dreyfus-type boss character and Charlie (the hip black cop) would have been a role similar to Francois.
Edwards' co-producer Tony Adams planned to produce one Panther film every three years in order to finance smaller projects, depending on how the movie would perform.
Principal photography on the two films began on February 15, 1982, at Pinewood Studios and concluded on June 2, 1982, in Brooklyn Heights, New York.
Since President Ronald Reagan's daughter Patti Davis was cast in the film, the production in Valencia was guarded by the United States Secret Service and the Spanish National Police Corps.
"Sellers and I usually thoroughly rehearsed set pieces (although not quite as much by Revenge, I have to admit) and shot them numerous times," as evidenced in the alternate takes as seen in Strikes Again/Trail and so forth.
Curse of the Pink Panther received unanimously negative critical reviews and was a box office bomb — with the general consensus being that attempting to continue The Pink Panther series without Sellers was a mistake, though some critics and fans thought that one positive aspect of the film was Moore's cameo, which is a humorous departure from his usual role of the suave and sophisticated hero, complete with falls, minced words and an ice bucket for most of his scenes that showed a previously unknown talent for physical and verbal comedy.
As a result, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer did not release Curse in the spring of 1983 as planned, instead it was pushed back until August with virtually no newspaper or television promotion for the film.
[6] Wass' option for several sequels was never taken up, though Edwards did start planning what would become Son of the Pink Panther around the time of the settlement – but MGM was not interested.
Gary Nelson directed Charlie Schlatter as a nice-guy television reporter investigating an arsonist, and who teams up with the cartoon Panther (who talks) to solve crimes.
[8] MGM produced a commercially successful revival, The Pink Panther (2006), starring Steve Martin as Clouseau, though this film is a reboot of the franchise rather than a continuation.