Comedy

REVIEW: Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes (S0103, 2014)

April 19, 2021

(Paramount+/Pluto/VOD) Personal note: This will be the last daily recommendation for the foreseeable future, for reasons detailed below. I hope I haven’t wasted too much of anyone’s time, and my many sincere thanks to those who have commented and those I’ve conversed with over the past ~275 recommendations. You’ve been a balm through this very difficult time.

REVIEW was a fictional Comedy Central show — adapted from a more irreverent Australian show of the same name — centered around soliciting life experience queries from people and then ‘life-reviewer’ Forrest MacNeil (legendary cult comedian/actor/writer Andy Daly) would then find a way to live the experience, review it, and rate it on a five-star system.

While the show could — and definitely leaned into — slapstick behavior, it more often than not tackled more emotional challenges. In -Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes-, the third episode of the opening season, Forrest is requested to:

1) Review eating 15 pancakes:

2) Review getting divorced (unfortunately not available via YouTube)

3) Review eating 30 pancakes:

Forrest commits to all of it and it’s so hilariously tragic, partially because he’s so blindly committed to his job, but also because he feels he has a personal contract with an audience that barely exists with which he has his own unwritten personal rules that he must abide by. (Especially in the -Divorce- segment, where most of the comedy is elicited by the fact that he feels he can’t tell his wife he’s doing this because of his show.)

I initially picked this episode as a quick-and-easy recommendation to write up but, while typing the above, I realized: Oh, fuck. I’ve become Forrest MacNeil.

I started these daily recommendations to give me a bit of structure and bonding with friends during lockdown. Also, I’d missed writing about media, as the last time I regularly did so was more than several years ago on my defunct videogame criticism/analysis website THE NEW GAMER. I thought: “I can find ~200-300 words a day about something I’ve watched that I love! Surely I can manage that for a year, or until I get to see a post-worthy film in a theater!”

That word limit lasted about three months. Then I added more unstated personal rules: I should post no later than midnight CST; if I haven’t watched it in over a year, I should re-watch it; if it’s an adaptation, I should read the book and comment on that; if there’s a TV adaptation, I should watch and touch on that. (To be fair, half of the time I had either already read the adaptation or watched some, if not all, of the TV adaptation. For example, my THE GHOST & MRS. MUIR recommendation with which I had previously done all three.)

Thanks to REVIEW, I’ve realized I’m currently writing these daily recommendations simply because of my own arbitrary rules and, while I love writing about media, it’s spun a bit out of control. It hasn’t been a bad experience by any means, but those dumb rules of mine ruined what was supposed to be a quick, dumb thing done for fun. That said, I’ll continue to write recommendations, but on far looser terms.

So, on that note, I’ll review this endeavor as Forrest MacNeil would: “Writing a daily media recommendation newsletter during a global pandemic: 4 stars.”

“This certainly is an upsetting number of pancakes.”

PLAYTIME (1967)

March 27, 2021

(Criterion/kanopy/VOD) One of the first screenings I attended upon moving to Chicago was for Jacques Tati’s MR. HULOT’S HOLIDAY at the Music Box Theatre. Sadly, it was in their sidecar theater and, if you think that room is ramshackle now, you should’ve seen it in the 90s. It was a matinee and, while I’d seen it before — I was introduced to Tati and MR. HULOT’S HOLIDAY back when I was a Purdue student — I couldn’t wait to see it in a proper theater, even if the screen wasn’t much larger that one in a college classroom.

Sadly, in a predictably Tati-esque manner, the print burned and tore apart no less than twenty minutes into the film. So it goes.

But! I’m here to extoll Tati’s PLAYTIME, both his greatest film, and also the film that would doom him. Before PLAYTIME, he was a celebrated physical comedian who had directed several very visually clever and humorous movies, including MR. HULOT’s HOLIDAY. PLAYTIME was to be his magnum opus, and he sunk all of his money into a number of dazzlingly huge sets, all constructed to fuel his vision of satirizing modern urban architecture and mode of living.

The end result was an absolute marvel. At the risk of sounding pretentious, it’s pure cinema, each frame densely packed with revelations, but never overwhelming the viewer. It’s a marvelous onion of a work, one where you’ll see something new with each and every screening, jam-packed with gags, either with the blocking, a flourish of color, someone’s line of sight, but the film is always in complete command when it needs to draw your attention to one of the few plot-related setups.

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve watched it. It’s one of the few films I’ll always make a point to catch when it comes to town. It’s an utter delight — one of a handful of films I consider ‘perfect’ — which is why it’s so sad that production overruns bankrupted Tati, then the film flopped upon release, and he never quite recovered from its failure.

EATING RAOUL (1982)

March 23, 2021

(HBO MAX/Criterion/VOD) While film seems to be endlessly fragmenting when it comes to genre, some genres seem to have completely fallen off the map, such as the satirical sex farce, which is the closest genre I can think of for EATING RAOUL.

As the trailer below details, EATING RAOUL is a very conflicted picture that tries to have its cake and eat it too, and mostly succeeds because of its absurdity. It’s about a comically straight-laced couple, Paul & Mary, a.k.a. Mr. And Mrs. Bland, a wine snob (character actor and director of DEATH RACE 2000 Paul Bartel) and a nurse (the distinctive horror character actor Mary Woronov), both of whom retire at night in twin beds, the former hugging a plush wine bottle, the latter clutching a number of stuffed animals. They live in an apartment complex full of swingers, and their American Dream is to own their own restaurant. While they found the perfect spot for their restaurant, someone’s about to grab it unless they’re able to pony up the cash, and quick.

So, they come to the conclusion that most modern America comes to: let’s kill and rob the deviants, one-by-one. They choose to do so with the symbol of American domesticity: the frying pan. Eventually they enlist the help of Raoul (Robert Beltran), a ‘hot-blooded emotional, crazy Chicano’ (their words — not mine) who, while turning the bodies into dog food for extra cash, also woos Mrs. Bland.

No, it’s not a subtle film, but the script is whipsmart:

“Mary, I just killed a man.”

“He was a man, honey. Now he’s just a bag of garbage.”

It’s a crazy script, and a crazy film and, while I don’t think it completely succeeds, it’s extremely audacious and entertaining. Frankly, I’m growing tired of capitalist satire being couched in miserable horror films that barely elicit a laugh.

BROADCAST NEWS (1987)

March 20, 2021

(HBO MAX/VOD) I watch BROADCAST NEWS about every five years, and every time my appreciation for it grows. I love how adults are posited more like immature teens, but still have to tackle serious issues like balancing their career and their personal desires; I love how the newsroom was brutally portrayed; I marvel at the unsure balancing of the love triangle; Jane Craig’s character is still a breath of fresh air, and how Holly Hunter absolutely nails her very distinct blend of determination, confidence, and anxiety; oh, how stellar the camerawork is, and the exactly attention paid to each edit.

My most recent viewing was by far the most special. Not only did I nab tickets to see it at TCM Fest 2017 so I finally managed to see it on a big screen — and with a bigger audience than my traditional audience of one — not only did Ben Mankiewicz lead a discussion with director James L. Brooks about the film, but co-star Albert Brooks was the surprise guest! Given how reluctant Brooks is to join in anything that comes close to an interview event, I was stunned to see him join James L. Brooks on stage, and I couldn’t have been happier to see -and- hear these two giants of dramatic and romantic comedy discuss this magnificent work.

I’d like to recommend Caroline Seide’s relatively recent article on BROADCAST NEWS — it’s part of her AV Club series ‘When Romance Met Comedy’ — as it’s a finely detailed examination as to why the film works so well, why it resonated then, and why it still holds up.

GALAVANT (2015-2016)

March 18, 2021

(DVD/VOD) While at first blush, this fantasy musical TV series from ABC (owned by Disney) may look like it’s solely for musical theater nerds and, while I may qualify for that moniker — I admit to spending some time in high school pit orchestra, and I did willfully throw away good money to see CATS on stage two years ago — it’s smart and clever and fun enough for everyone.

Created by Dan Fogelman (who penned the similarly subversive princess film TANGLED, but is probably best known now as the creator of THIS IS US), it’s a gleefully self-aware gaggle of fairy tale male savior tropes turned on its ear, all to the tune of Alan Menken songs. Even better, every single one of the characters are interesting and very human, all fleshed out and given their own quirks, despite the fact that the show could have coasted along on caricatures.

The cast is phenomenal and includes Timothy Omundson as the idiotic king (handsomely unrecognizable from his days on MONK), Vinnie Jones as the king’s heavy hand (yes, he does sing, and he’s hilarious), Mallory Jansen as Galavant’s ‘stolen’ love, Luke Youngblood (COMMUNITY’s Magnitude) as a plucky sidekick, not to mention an astounding guest cast including: Rutger Hauer, Weird Al, John Stamos, Hugh Bonneville, Kylie Minogue, Nick Frost, and Anthony Head.

It’s utterly delightful but inexplicably unavailable via Disney+. That said, it’s well-worth hunting down a digital copy or the DVD set.

There’s a very long trailer for the first season, but it amplifies the drama and downplays the music and comedy. I recommend the German trailer instead, which is just the intro of the pilot but with German subtitles.

Disney Germany S1 opener:

American S1 trailer:

If you still aren’t sold, check out these S2 trailers/openers, because that’s really when the show doubled-down on its very specific brand of nonsense:

S2 opener:

S2’s penultimate episode’s opener (don’t be afraid of spoilers!):

I’m very grateful to my wife for boosting this show to me, even though I bluntly said ‘I don’t think I need that’ when she first recommended it to me.

THE CHRIS GETHARD SHOW (2011-2018)

March 13, 2021

(HBO MAX/VOD) THE CHRIS GETHARD SHOW was a comedy/variety show from UCB comedian and podcaster Chris Gethard (best known for BEAUTIFUL STORIES FROM ANONYMOUS PEOPLE) that started on Manhattan public television, then leapt to Fusion TV, then truTV picked it up and, after a year, they unceremoniously canceled the show.

Gethard spearheaded this anarchic, supremely kindhearted show whose closest comparison is probably PEE-WEE’S PLAYHOUSE because of its endearing cast of wacky characters and overall earnestness.

I came to the show late and never saw any of the public TV eps, but it quickly became appointment television. The best introduction is probably -One Man’s Trash- (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nwi_kE0gy94 ) which features Paul Scheer and Jason Mantzoukas guessing the content of the show’s dumpster. The reveal is amazing, and by far one of the best moments of TV in the past decade.

I’d be remiss to not mention that Shannon O’Neill is Gethard’s sidekick, and I believe she is legally required to play every non-leading film or TV production role in every TV show, as she’s basically played the same character on DIFFICULT PEOPLE, HIGH MAINTENANCE, UNCLE PECKERHEAD, -and- BLACK BEAR.

You can view the three Fusion/truTV seasons via HBO MAX because apparently there’s no rhyme or reason as to what streams anywhere now, but a bunch of the eps are available via Gethard’s YouTube account as well.

PATRICE O’NEAL: KILLING IS EASY (2021)

March 7, 2021

(Comedy Central/VOD) I revel in hearing comedians discussing their process, when they bomb, when they kill, what it took to get from the former to the latter, and Michael Bonfiglio’s examination of Patrice O’Neal, who passed in 2011, is an exceptional example of a documentary about a comedian that provides insight while pulling no punches.

The doc handles his backstory more in-depth than most comedian documentaries by having a fair amount of access to his childhood family, friends, even the headmaster of his high school. While his family and friends keep the majority of their remarks polite and affable, the comedians chosen for the doc, certainly do not. The comedians that appear are all ones that you’d recognize if you been paying attention to stand-up in the 90s (Colin Quinn, Denis Leary, Bill Burr, Jim Norton — a lot of TOUGH CROWD folks) and while they all respected his comedic skill, they make it very clear that O’Neal was an absolute asshole, and would double-down on bad engagement and bad opinions. Of course, they also hand wave a lot of that away as “truth telling”, but that’s a subject for another time.

It’s a surprisingly frank portrayal, especially given that comedian Von Decarlo, his fiancée, was the executive producer of the documentary. It’s also a welcome one, if the subject matter interests you and you can overlook the macho approach of much of the comedy.

THEODORA GOES WILD (1936)

March 6, 2021

(YouTube/DVD) THEODORA GOES WILD is a screwball comedy that not only features winsome repartee between leads Irene Dunne and Melvyn Douglas, but is also about liberating men and women from cultural shackles.

Dunne is Theodora Lynn, a Sunday school teacher by day, but racy, explicit romance author by night. No one but her publisher knows about her writerly habits, at least until Michael Grant (Douglas) the progressive cover artist of her book, discovers her secret and finds himself hellbent to convince her to come clean and live an open life, one where she be proud of her achievements and can actually spend her well-earned novel money. Consequently, he shows up in Theodora’s small town and weasels his way into her life posing as a gardener, and antics ensue.

It’s a tightly scripted, rollickingly good time from director Richard Boleslawski, based on a story from Mary McCarthy (who certainly pitched it as a story she wanted to see on screen). Yes, there’s some dated content, but it has aged remarkably well.

THE THIN MAN (1934)

February 14, 2021

(VOD/Every other week on TCM) THE THIN MAN is based on the Dashiell Hammett detective novel of the same name but, while the pre-code film adaptation retains the same narrative bones as the book, it backgrounds the murder mystery in favor of the boozy, flirty interplay between spouses Nick & Nora Charles, resulting in one of most winsome on-screen couples.

Like the book, Nora (Myrna Loy) is a rich socialite, and Nick (William Powell) is a man who gave up his detective badge to marry her, and they have a dog in lieu of children. They spend their copious recreational time running around night clubs, garnering hanger-ons and hangovers, making each other laugh with witty banter and, in general, having one good time after another, at least until Nick gets roped into investigating a murder. What makes them such a great on-screen couple is that, yes, Nick is the investigator, but Nora is often the instigator, has just as much insight and deductive powers as Nick, she takes no shit, and Nick is always willing to indulge her. They both push-and-pull each other with an endless amount of quips and gazes, and love each other for doing so.

While it’s always worth watching Loy & Powell together, what really makes the film resonate is the sparkling script penned by married couple Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, who had an amazing tandem career both as playwrights (they won a Pulitzer for their stageplay of THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK) and screenwriters (they also worked on FATHER OF THE BRIDE, IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE, and SEVEN BRIDES FOR SEVEN BROTHERS). They were not shy about admitting that they poured much of their relationship into the screenplay, and it shows, as they feel like a real forever-love couple — doting, a bit combative, occasionally prickly, always respectful — but never in a cloying way. It’s a delightful watch, a film I never tire of.

  • If you’re interested in reading more about Goodrich & Hackett, I suggest the combined biography of the two in THE REAL NICK AND NORA by David L. Goodrich.

VIBES (1988)

February 8, 2021

(Prime/VOD) When I first found out about VIBES a few months ago via TCM Underground, I was very upset. “What do you mean there was a late-80s film with Cyndi Lauper, Peter Falk -and- Jeff Goldblum? Why am I just finding out about this?!” Now that I’ve had a chance to watch it, I can understand why it never registered on my radar but I do feel it’s the sort of film that anyone who has any interest in either of the three performers — which I think encompasses most of humanity — needs to know about.

VIBES capitalized on the short-lived mid-80s screwball romantic adventure genre spurred by ROMANCING THE STONE and the like. It’s comprised of two psychics (Lauper & Goldblum) who are enlisted by a dodgy cad (Peter Falk) to track down treasure in a lost Incan city. As you’d expect, the romantic intrigue and banter between Lauper & Goldblum should be enough to propel the film forward but, sadly, Goldblum’s halting delivery hampers an already weak vaudevillian script. For example, here’s an exchange between veteren character actor Michael Lerner and Peter Falk, regarding Falk’s wife: “Harry, I once slept with your wife.” “Estelle? Or Vivian?” “Both.” “Well, you’re one up on me!” (Cue rimshot.)

The sole highlight is Lauper as a 1980s Mae West but, sadly, the material simply isn’t there to let her shine. While she has the enthusiasm and rhythm for the role, her jokes rely on a more energetic and combative performer than the languid Goldblum (who has since been given far more opportunities to hone his comedic timing than Lauper).

I don’t want to oversell -or- undersell this film. Veteran TV director Ken Kwapis does the best with the material as he can, Julian Sands does a classic Julian Sands heel turn, and Steve Buscemi briefly appears as a sad-sack gambler! It’s an intriguing oddity, and it’s worth your time if your Venn diagram of interests intersect with any of those I listed above.