The film, which was based on the 1959 book of the same name by Walter Tevis, stars Paul Newman as Fast Eddie, Jackie Gleason as Minnesota Fats, Piper Laurie as Sarah, George C. Scott as Bert, and Myron McCormick as Charlie.

Its exploration of winning, losing, and character garnered a number of major awards; it is also credited with helping to spark a resurgence in the popularity of pool.

[3] In 1997, the Library of Congress selected The Hustler for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Rossen, who had hustled pool himself as a youth and who had made an abortive attempt to write a pool-themed play called Corner Pocket, optioned the book and teamed with Sidney Carroll to produce the script.

[8] Newman was originally unavailable to play Fast Eddie regardless, being committed to star opposite Elizabeth Taylor in the film Two for the Seesaw.

[10] When Taylor was forced to drop out of Seesaw because of shooting overruns on Cleopatra, Newman was freed up to take the role, which he accepted after reading just half of the script.

[9] No one associated with the production officially notified Darin or his representatives that he had been replaced; they found out from a member of the public at a charity horse race.

[12] Other shooting locations included a townhouse on East 82nd Street, which served as the Louisville home of Murray Hamilton's character Findley, and the Manhattan Greyhound bus terminal.

The film crew built a dining area that was so realistic that confused passengers sat there and waited to place their orders.

[14] Rossen, in pursuit of the style he termed "neo-neo-realistic",[15] hired actual street thugs, enrolled them in the Screen Actors Guild and used them as extras.

[17] Early shooting put more focus on the pool playing, but during filming Rossen made the decision to place more emphasis on the love story between Newman and Laurie's characters.

"[20] Roger Ebert concurs with this assessment, citing The Hustler as "one of the few American movies in which the hero wins by surrendering, by accepting reality instead of his dreams".

Of the pool hall inhabitants, only Minnesota Fats, who never handles money himself, focusing only on the game he is playing, is uncorrupted and undamaged by the end.

Rossen often points out and exposes class divisions; for example, when Minnesota Fats asks Preacher, a junkie willing to run errands, to get him some "White Tavern whiskey, a glass and some ice", Eddie counters by ordering cheap bourbon, without any of the niceties: "J.T.S.

[22] No film of the 1950s, Mordden asserts, "took such a brutal, clear look at the ego-affirmation of the one-on-one contest, at the inhumanity of the winner or the castrated vulnerability of the loser".

[23] Mordden does note that while Fast Eddie "has a slight fifties ring",[24] the character "makes a decisive break with the extraordinarily feeling tough guys of the 'rebel' era ... [b]ut he does end up seeking out his emotions"[24] and telling Bert that he is a loser because he's dead inside.

Prior to the premiere, Richard Burton hosted a midnight screening of the film for the casts of the season's Broadway shows, which generated a great deal of positive word of mouth.

The website's critical consensus reads: "Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason give iconic performances in this dark, morally complex tale of redemption.

Variety praised the performances of the entire main cast but felt that the "sordid aspects" of the story prevented the film from achieving the "goal of being pure entertainment".

Kauffmann strongly praised the principal cast, calling Newman "first-rate" and writing that Scott's was "his most credible performance to date".

"[31] A. H. Weiler of The New York Times, despite finding that the film "strays a bit" and that the romance between Newman and Laurie's characters "seems a mite far-fetched", nonetheless found that The Hustler "speaks powerfully in a universal language that spellbinds and reveals bitter truths".

[14] TV Guide calls the film a "dark stunner",[48] offering "a grim world whose only bright spot is the top of the pool table, yet [with] characters [who] maintain a shabby nobility and grace".

[3] The film also brought recognition to Willie Mosconi, who, despite having won multiple world championships, was virtually unknown to the general public.

Wanderone immediately adopted the Minnesota Fats nickname and parlayed his association with the film into book and television deals and other ventures.