On an otherwise ordinary day in 2003, 64-year-old Jerry Selbee, a recent retiree living in the tiny Michigan town of Evart, drove to a small store in Mesick, roughly an hour away, and bought some lottery tickets.
Twenty-two hundred of them.
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| Convenience store owner Bill (Rainn Wilson, right) reacts with understandable surprise when Jerry (Bryan Cranston) and his wife Marge (Annette Bening) explain how many lottery tickets they wish to purchase. |
Quickly realizing that his statistical sample had been too small, the next time around he purchased 3,400 tickets … and won $6,300.
Jerry, whose varied professional career had included a lengthy stint as a materials analyst for Kellogg’s — yes, the cereal company — had discovered a mathematical flaw in Michigan’s Winfall state lottery game.
What happened next is depicted with cheeky merriment by director David Frankel and screenwriter Brad Copeland, adapted from Jason Fagone’s fascinating 2018 article in the Huffington Post (which absolutely is worth a read).
Bryan Cranston is perfectly cast as the quietly unassuming, buttoned-down Jerry: one of those mysterious mathematical savants capable of spotting patterns, where the rest of us would see only numbers (assuming we even looked in the first place). Cranston is ably supported by Annette Bening, as Jerry’s pragmatic wife Marge; the two actors are wholly persuasive as this adorably devoted couple.
Copeland’s screenplay condenses Jerry’s peripatetic working life to just a lengthy career at Kellogg’s: a forgivable shift from actual fact, since the only important detail is that the story begins as Jerry retires, and — not the type to feel comfortable without some project to occupy his whirlwind mind — frets about what to do next.
It certainly won’t have anything to do with the fishing boat that his family and friends surprise him with.
Nor is Jerry interested in any of the many suggestions — travel, buy a flash car — that come from their amiable friend and accountant, Steve (Larry Wilmore).
But Jerry does become intrigued, after picking up a brochure for the state’s new Winfall lottery game. A scan of the rules, and odds, quickly reveals a defect in one aspect of the game. (This involves a “roll down,” which is too mathematically complicated to describe in this review. Fagone’s lengthy article explains it.)
Cranston’s blend of disbelief, dawning awareness and excitement, is priceless.
Copeland has established, as was the case in real life, that Jerry is a cautious man, not given to reckless behavior. More to the point, their modest savings account won’t permit much in the way of error. On top of which, he knows that his far more prudent wife never would tolerate such a gamble.
But it isn’t a gamble, he realizes, because the math is sound. (And let’s hear it for the supremacy of scientific fact.)
And, so, he secretly withdraws a chunk of cash from the bank; this prompts the first of several cute exchanges with the teller, Mindy (adorably played by Lindsay Rootare).
Once persuaded that his system is sound, Jerry is too good a husband to keep his wife in the dark. Bening’s slow-take reaction is marvelous; although he expects Marge to shut him down, she surprises him by wholly embracing the scheme. After all, it’s something they can do together.
After which, things get truly crazy (as they did, in real life).
Frankel and Copeland shade this film as a larkish, gently comedic romp; that may seem like Hollywood artifice, but — honestly — Fagone’s article makes it sound like the actual Jerry and Marge had the time of their lives.
It’s also important to note that they didn’t cheat; no rules were broken. This isn’t a scam, such as the rigged McDonald’s Monopoly game chronicled so well in the 2020 HBO series, McMillion$.
Rainn Wilson is hilariously mischievous as Bill, a convenience store owner initially just intrigued by Jerry and Marge’s desire to purchase so many tickets, and soon eager to become part of the action. (His character is based on Paul Mardas, owner of Billy’s Beverages, in Sunderland, Mass.)
Michael McKean and Ann Harada are equally fun as neighbors Howard and Shirley; Jake McDorman and Anna Camp make the most of their smaller roles as two of Jerry and Marge’s adult children, Doug and Dawn.
Every good story needs a villain, and this one is no different. As the second act proceeds, the scene shifts to Harvard, where tech students Tyler (Uly Schlesinger) and Eric (Cheech Manohar) have discovered the same Winfall flaw; they’ve roped a dorm full of fellow students into similar block-purchases of tickets. Tyler and Eric also deduce — via illegal hacking — that they’re competing with Jerry and Marge.
Schlesinger plays Tyler as an arrogant, obnoxious and thoroughly unlikable twerp. (We genuinely loathe him.) His subsequent confrontation with Jerry and Marge, complete with a demand to “cease or else,” feels quite ominous.
Can math get Jerry out of this fix?
(In real life, the students were at MIT, led by James Harvey and Yuran Lu, who never challenged Jerry and Marge in such a manner. So we’ll excuse this shift as filmmakers’ dramatic license.)
Tracie Thoms has a key role in the third act, as dogged Boston Globe reporter Maya Jordan, who becomes increasingly intrigued by all of these shenanigans. (Her character is based on real-world Globe reporter Andrea Estes, who also was part of the investigative team that exposed the Catholic Church’s child-abuse scandal, depicted in the Oscar-winning 2015 film, Spotlight.)
Frankel has a flair for turning quirky, real-world sagas into delightful films, as he previously did with The Devil Wears Prada and One Chance. This new film hews closer to established fact, which makes it even more captivating.
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