Theater Camp: Concept, 8; laughs, 10

Theater Camp (2023) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for occasional profanity and drug references

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 7.28.23

This is one of the most sarcastic — yet affectionate — films I’ve ever seen.

 

Also one of the funniest.

 

Whilte the young cast members stare in nervous astonishment, Amos (Ben Platt) and
Rebecca-Diane (Molly Gordon) interrupt a rehearsal to indulge in another of their
many artistic arguments.

Granted, theater people are an easy target, with all their quirks and ostentatiously sincere eccentricities. Co-directors Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman clearly know their way backstage, and their script — co-written with Noah Galvin — explores territory that’ll instantly be familiar to any parent whose adolescent child has been bitten by the stage bug (along with all the other adults who’ve politely endured community theater productions).

Gordon and Lieberman’s mockumentary was a smash hit at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, and took home the coveted U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award.

 

So … let the curtain rise!

 

With summer approaching, AdirondACTS founder Joan (Amy Sedaris) and general manager Rita (Caroline Aaron) once again scout local school theater productions, in order to entice kids to attend — and their parents to help fund — their scrappy upstate New York theater camp. Alas, this undertaking proves calamitous; the strobe effects during a production of Bye, Bye Birdie send Joan into a shock coma.

 

(The fact that this crisis is milked for humor, gives a sense of how edgy the script will be.)

 

Responsibility for overseeing the summer’s activities therefore falls to Joan’s oblivious “crypto bro” son, Troy (Jimmy Tatro), a clueless failure-to-launch who probably didn’t graduate junior high school. His arrival coincides with busloads of eager young thespians, which horrifies Rita and the rest of the staff, notably drama instructors Amos (Ben Platt) and Rebecca-Diane (Molly Gordon). Their goal: to keep Troy the hell away from day-to-day activities.

 

Alas, Troy is so dense that he can’t take even sledge-hammer hints. His effort to introduce himself to the assembled children, on the first morning, totally fails to quell the eager chatter of reuniting friends and eager newcomers.

 

Then Amos grabs the microphone and croons “Oh, what a beautiful…”

 

…at which point, all the kids snap to attention and sing, in unison, “morning!”

 

Right then, the film becomes can’t-miss captivating.

Dear Evan Hansen: A letter to remember

Dear Evan Hansen (2021) • View trailer

Four stars (out of five). Rated PG-13, for dramatic intensity and fleeting profanity

Available via: Movie theaters

By Derrick Bang • Published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.24.21

Well, this is an emotional hurricane.

 

The Broadway production of Dear Evan Hansen won six of its nine Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical, in many cases edging out Come From Away (which was Broadway robbery, in my humble opinion, but that’s a separate conversation).

 

Although circumstances have brought him closer to the girl he has long adored from
afar, Evan (Ben Platt) knows that his blossoming relationship with Zoe (Kaitlyn Dever)
is built upon a lie.

Evan’s messages of inclusion, self-acceptance and mended fences obviously resonated strongly with theatergoers, and I’m sure the same will be true of filmgoers. It’s refreshing to see a story about the importance of acknowledging one’s mistakes … sincerely, and in public. (A lot of politicians could learn from this example.)

That said, the story also veers dangerously close to the ragged edge of unpardonable behavior … and whether matters slide off that cliff, will depend on the individual viewer.

 

Playwright Steven Levenson, one of the Tony winners, has transformed his own book into this screenplay; Broadway star Ben Platt, also a Tony winner, reprises his lead role here. Ergo, there’s no question of fidelity … although I note the addition of two new songs by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (again, Tony winners), one of which — along with some, ah, adjustments by Levenson — definitely softens the harshness of the finale.

 

But it’s still painfully brutal.

 

Evan is a traditional musical, with distinct songs that enhance (or interrupt) a conventional storyline. That makes it a bit retro in this post-Les Misérables and Hamilton era, with most musicals relying more heavily on rap and operetta stagings. This softer, gentler approach is absolutely right for Evan, given its focus on vulnerability and fragility.

 

Director Stephen Chbosky echoes this choice. Most of the songs are poignant ballads, and you’ll find no opulent production numbers here; the introductory montage is as fancy as matters get.

 

High school senior Evan Hansen (Platt) has long suffered from social anxiety; he feels isolated, forever on the outside looking in (“Waving Through a Window”). One arm is in a cast — the reason for this injury, tellingly, remains undisclosed — and nobody is willing to sign it: not even his sole friend, Jared (Nik Dodani, channeling his near-identical role in Netflix’s Atypical).

 

Evan writes motivational letters to himself, as a means of bucking up his optimism about what might be good about each day. Such hopes do not include an unfortunate encounter with the volatile Connor Murphy (Colton Ryan) — also a loner, but angry and aggressive — who shoves Evan in the school hallway. Connor’s younger sister Zoe (Kaitlyn Dever) apologizes for this, which makes it worse, because Evan has long crushed on her.

 

Ricki and the Flash: Rock on!

Ricki and the Flash (2015) • View trailer 
3.5 stars. Rated PG-13, for dramatic intensity, sexuality, brief profanity and mild drug content
By Derrick Bang

I haven’t been this nervous about a wedding toast since the aggressively unstable Anne Hathaway seized the microphone, in 2008’s Rachel Getting Married.

Come to think of it, that film also was directed by Jonathan Demme. He must have a thing about weddings...

Julie (Mamie Gummer, far left), Ricki (Meryl Streep) and Pete (Kevin Kline) chortle over
fading photographs and other memorabilia from long-ago times, when they still lived
together as an actual family.

Meryl Streep’s Ricki Rendazzo isn’t unstable, but she’s a social misfit and family pariah in every other respect: a free spirit who, decades earlier, abandoned a husband and three children — Julie, Joshua and Daniel — in order to pursue a rock ’n’ roll career in sunny California. Now reduced to leading the house band at a hole-in-the-wall San Fernando bar dubbed the Salt Well, Ricki’s few faithful fans number bar flies and struggling blue-collar regulars who show up nightly to stave off lives of (we assume) quiet desperation.

But one thing: an important thing. Ricki truly can rock, as proven each evening, when she and her band cover popular power anthems such as “American Girl,” “Wooly Bully” and “Keep Playing that Rock ’n’ Roll.” Which begs an obvious question: Is there anything Streep can’t do? Because yes, that’s her own voice and bad-ass self, and she also learned enough rhythm guitar licks to look credible on camera.

Ricki and the Flash represents a crowd-pleasing comeback for scripter Diablo Cody, who stalled after winning that well-deserved Academy Award for 2007’s Juno. The immediate follow-ups — Jennifer’s Body and Young Adult — were disappointing, to say the least; happily, Cody once again has found her groove. This new dramedy has the tart dialogue, fractured family dynamics and sly social observations that made Juno so beguiling.

And if Ricki occasionally feels like a rock-inflected Hollywood fairy tale, it’s hard to complain when such a stellar cast handles the material with sharp-edged aplomb.

Ricki’s nightly sessions at the Salt Well don’t pay the rent; by day, she struggles to maintain a sunny smile while selling overpriced gourmet foods as a cashier at Goodwill, an upscale, Whole Foods-ish supermarket where all employees are expected to maintain pod people-style grins. (Wish I could credit the actor who does so well in his tiny role as Ricki’s micro-managing boss, but — alas — the press notes aren’t that complete.)

Even with the two gigs, Ricki barely makes ends meet. Sadder still, her off-stage self-esteem is so low that she can’t even acknowledge the sincere romantic overtures coming her way from Greg, the band’s lead guitarist (rock legend Rick Springfield, looking very fine). She can’t quite make the “L” word pass between her lips.

Then, unexpected catastrophe: Ex-husband Pete (Kevin Kline) calls from Indianapolis, where he lives in a hilariously ostentatious mansion with second wife Maureen (Audra McDonald). Pete is worried because Julie has returned home, completely unhinged, after being dumped unexpectedly by her husband. Bewildered but also oddly flattered by the call — Streep fine-tunes this wealth of emotions with such subtle skill — Ricki responds to vestiges of maternal instinct and hops a plane.

Rarely, upon her arrival, has a fish been so far removed from water.