Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed U.S. city, the horror film “The Shade” features a predominantly white group of people (with a few Latin people and African Americans) representing the working-class and middle-class.
Culture Clash: A 20-year-old man, who witnessed his father’s suicide when he was a child, is haunted by visions of harpy.
Culture Audience: “The Shade” will appeal mainly to people who don’t mind watching slow-paced horror movies that leave too many questions unanswered.
“The Shade” is the equivalent of a vehicle that runs out of power and gets stuck in the mud. This repetitive horror movie fails to answer crucial questions in this gloomy story about a young man haunted by a harpy. The technical aspects of “The Shade”—such as the movie’s cinematography, makeup and visual effects—are competent in creating an eerie atmosphere. The acting performances are average but watchable. It’s too bad that “The Shade” wastes its story potential by over-relying on the same “scare tactics” and not doing enough to explain why major things in the movie happened.
Written and directed by Tyler Chipman, “The Shade” takes place in an unnamed U.S. city. The movie was actually filmed in Massachusetts. The protagonist of “The Shade” is 20-year-old Ryan Beckman (played by Chris Galust), who is haunted by witnessing his father’s suicide when Ryan was a child of about 7 or 8 years old. The movie opens with Ryan having a nightmare about this suicide.
In the nightmare, Ryan as a child (played by Kellen Raffaelo) is driven to a graveyard at night by his father Randall “Randy” Beckman (played by Robert Marsella), who sets fires to a particular grave headstone. On the headstone is Randall’s name. His birth year listed as 1969, and his death year is listed as 2021. After setting fire to the grave, Randall shoots himself while a horrified Ryan watches.
The adult Ryan has anxiety issues and has been prescribed unnamed medication that he is reluctant to take, but he self-medicates by smoking a lot of marijuana. Ryan is also in therapy. His therapist is Dr. Derick Huston (played by Michael Boatman), who is compassionate and understanding. These therapy sessions don’t amount to much except Ryan telling Dr. Huston that he has trouble sleeping because of nightmares.
Ryan lives with his mother Renee Beckman (played by Laura Benanti) and his 9-year-old brother James “Jamie” Beckman (played by Sam Duncan), who likes to play video games with Ryan. Jamie and Ryan have an older brother named Jason (played by Dylan McTee), who is just as mopey and moody as Ryan, but Jason has a nasty temper and is quick to get violent.
Early on in the movie, Jason moves back into the family household because he has left college. Ryan is annoyed because no one in the family wants to say why Jason left college. One night, Jason is playing heavy metal music loudly in his room. When Ryan goes to the room to tell Jason to turn down the volume, he sees a harpy (played by Charlotte Stickles) hiding in the room. No one believes Ryan.
Ryan is a college student who has two part-time jobs: a pizza maker/delivery person at a pizza place and an apprentice at a tattoo shop, a place where he hopes to eventually work full-time. Ryan has a devoted and loving girlfriend name Alejandra, nicknamed Alex (played by Mariel Molino), whose sassy gay cousin Nicolas Silva (played by Germain Arroyo) is Ryan’s best friend. Nicholas is also Ryan’s college classmate and co-worker at the pizza place.
“The Shade” is nothing but Ryan repeatedly seeing the harpy, in between long, dull stretches of this 127-minute movie. At first, Ryan thinks he’s the only person who can see the harpy, but he eventually finds out that other people can see the harpy too. The harpy is supposed to represent grief, but “The Shade” can’t decide if it wants to be a horror movie or a psychological drama about grief that affects an entire family. Don’t expect to get any answers about why Randall “Randy” Beckman committed suicide. Worst of all is the ending of “The Shade,” which is a complete letdown after doing a shoddy job of building any suspense or answering vital questions.
Level 33 Entertainment released “The Shade” in U.S. cinemas on September 20, 2024.
Culture Representation: Taking place in New York state’s Montauk, Long Island, the comedy film “No Hard Feelings” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few Latinos and Asians and one Native American) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: A 32-year-old Uber driver/restaurant worker is in danger of losing her house due to unpaid tax bills, so she desperately agrees to be paid to take the virginity of a lonely and socially awkward 19-year-old man, who comes from a wealthy family.
Culture Audience: “No Hard Feelings” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching cringeworthy sex comedies that have very outdated comedy gimmicks involving older women and younger men.
“No Hard Feelings” is a cringeworthy sex comedy in all the wrong ways. It has few laugh-out-loud moments and mostly recycles crude clichés from 1980s comedies about nerds losing their virginities. Jennifer Lawrence’s full-frontal nude scene reeks of desperation. It’s obvious that Lawrence wants to toss aside her “prestige actress” image for her starring role in “No Hard Feelings” (she’s also one of the producers of this train wreck), but there’s something kind of pathetic about how hard she’s trying to be “edgy,” when this outdated movie is as edgy as a used condom from 1984.
Directed by Gene Stupnitsky (who co-wrote the “No Hard Feelings” screenplay with John Phillips), “No Hard Feelings” has a very “male gaze” to it because it’s a sex comedy where the only full-frontal nudity is from the female gender. Even though there are men in sex scenes too, these men are never shown fully naked in the movie. (Lawrence’s full-frontal nude scene isn’t a sex scene, but it’s a scene that’s meant to be provocative.) It all looks like wish-fulfillment fantasies from sexist filmmakers who want to see women fully naked in their movies but not men fully naked in the same movies.
Everything about this dreck looks like it was written and directed by people who think female empowerment should mean being an obnoxious sex worker who doesn’t want to admit to being a sex worker. Let’s call it what it is: “No Hard Feelings” is about sex work, prostitution, or whatever term you want to use for anyone who has sex in exchange for cash or something of monetary value.
“No Hard Feelings” is being marketed on the concept that a 32-year-old woman named Maddie Barker (played by Lawrence) is desperate for money. And so, she answers an ad placed by two wealthy parents, who are offering a Buick to a young woman who can take the virginity of their reclusive 19-year-old son. The domineering parents have such control over their son’s life, they’ve put a GPS tracker on his phone.
Maddie is a lifelong resident of the beach hamlet Montauk, Long Island, in New York state. It’s an area where many affluent residents of New York City have homes that they often go to for the summer. The year-long residents of Montauk are usually working-class people who are in service jobs where they have to interact with upper-middle-class and wealthy people who are Montauk’s part-time residents. Maddie has a major attitude problem about not being as educated or wealthy as these part-time Montauk residents who can afford to have more than one home.
Later, it’s explained why she has this prejudice: Her biological father is rich, married and a New York City resident who has another home in Montauk. He had an affair with Maddie’s mother, who is now deceased. Maddie was the result of this extramarital affair, and she was raised by her single mother. Her biological father is still alive, he has another family with his wife, and he wants nothing to do with Maddie.
Maddie has two part-time jobs: one as an Uber driver and the other as a restaurant employee at a casual eatery named Charters. She lives in the house that she inherited from her mother. The house was paid for by Maddie’s biological father. Maddie has gotten behind on her real-estate taxes, so there’s a lien on her house, which she’s in danger of losing soon if she doesn’t come up with the money to pay the taxes.
Adding to her financial woes, Maddie hasn’t been making her car payments either. The movie’s opening scene (which is partially shown in the movie’s trailer) has her car being repossessed by a tow-truck driver named Gary (played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach), a sad sack who happens to be Maddie’s most recent ex-boyfriend. Maddie dumped Gary by abruptly cutting off communication with him, and he’s very hurt about it.
Maddie tries to flirt with and charm Gary so he won’t repossess her car. She leads him to believe that she might be interested in getting back together with him. This deception might have worked if Maddie’s latest fling (played by Christian Galvis), a hunky Italian guy, hadn’t come out of the house and made it clear that Maddie has definitely moved on from Gary. None of this is spoiler information, since it’s in the “No Hard Feelings” trailer.
Maddie no longer has the car that she needs to work as an Uber driver. There’s some not-very-amusing scenes of Maddie using roller blades as a means of transportation. It’s just an excuse for the movie to show some slapstick comedy of Maddie trying not to fall down when she goes to certain places on these roller blades. She also tries and fails to steal back her car from Gary—while she’s on roller blades. It all looks so corny and fake.
A frustrated Maddie soon sees an unusual ad that she thinks will be the solution to her financial problems: Two wealthy parents named Laird Becker (played by Matthew Broderick) and Allison Becker (played by Laura Benanti) are looking for a woman in her early-to-mid-20s to “date” their virginal 19-year-old son Percy Becker (played by Andrew Barth Feldman), in exchange for the woman getting a brand new Buick. The parents are worried because Percy is a socially awkward loner, and they want him to be more socially experienced before he enrolls in Princeton University as a freshman student.
This flimsy premise has so many problems. First, losing one’s virginity does not automatically give someone social skills. Second, it would have been a lot easier for Maddie to find a job that pays fast cash instead of going to the trouble of finding another car and then having to wait to get Uber customer requests for low-paying rides. Anyone who knows anything about Uber drivers (and all the non-union employee issues that Uber drivers have) knows that people do not get loads of money from being an Uber driver. Uber drivers also have to pay for their own car expenses, thereby reducing any wages they make as an Uber driver.
Third, who really believes that someone can pay off tax debts large enough for a house lien by being an Uber driver for a few weeks? “No Hard Feelings” expects viewers to believe this nonsense. And let’s not forget that the area where Maddie lives (the New York City metropolitan area) has among of the highest costs of living in the United States. Fourth, although Maddie sneers a few times about how “stupid” Percy is because he’s sheltered and lacking in street smarts, Maddie isn’t very intelligent herself. She wastes a lot of time hoping to get a Buick out of this “dating deal,” when she could’ve spent the time making real money.
But the witless plot of “No Hard Feelings” wouldn’t exist if it actually treated the female protagonist with some respect and had some unique cleverness. Instead, what viewers will see is a lot of Maddie acting entitled and combative to almost everyone she meets, but the filmmakers are trying to make this awfulness look like “female empowerment.” No one is expecting Maddie to be completely likeable, but there’s not much reason for viewers to root for this idiotic character.
And there’s more of Maddie’s stupidity on display. Maddie answers the ad by meeting Laird and Allison in person. Maddie arrives at the Becker house on roller blades. Laird and Allison ask Maddie to come up the high outdoor stairs into the house. Instead of taking off her roller blades, which is what any sensible person would do, Maddie clumsily tries to move up the stairs while on roller blades. It’s a sight gag that’s very stale.
In the meeting with these two creepy parents, it’s made clear that they expect Maddie to take Percy’s virginity, in order for her to get paid by getting the Buick. Maddie agrees to the parents’ demand to keep this deal a secret from Percy. This is sex work, but Maddie denies it by saying to the parents: “I’m not a sex worker.” Yes, Maddie, you are a sex worker, even if it’s just for a one-time deal. Admit it, own it, and move on.
Maddie tells the parents her real age, but she’s able to convince them that she’s a better candidate for the job than women in their early-to-mid-20s, whom Maddie thinks are too emotionally immature. It’s ironic, because Maddie is by far the most emotionally immature person in the movie. Percy is sheltered but he has a much better sense of respect for himself and other people than Maddie has.
And therein lies much of the problem with “No Hard Feelings”: It tries very hard to make Maddie look like a “free spirit” (she’s actually very mean-spirited) who wants to be perceived as a “liberated woman,” but the entire movie is about her actually being at the financial mercy of two wealthy manipulators who have hired her to be a sex worker. Maddie wants to be “tough” (she gets into physical fights with people), but she doesn’t want to be labeled a “sex worker,” because in her mind, being a sex worker makes her a bad person.
This is the mentality of filmmakers who have a madonna/whore complex in how women are portrayed in their movies: The women are either “virtuous” (not shown having sex in the movie) or “sinful” (shown having sex in the movie), with no realistic in-between. It’s a very backwards and misogynistic mindset often found in teenage sex comedies of the 1980s, where the geeky guys are the sympathetic heroes, and the (usually older) women they want to have sex with are hot-tempered and horny seductresses.
The Maddie character is the embodiment of this very tired and over-used stereotype. Expect to hear repetitive and not-very-funny jokes about the age gap between Maddie and Percy. Maddie is constantly mortified that, at 32 years old, she is often perceived as “old” by Percy’s peers. How about this, Maddie? Instead of worrying about being considered “old,” you should be worrying that your life has come down to having sex for a Buick. And let’s not forget that this Buick is not a guarantee that it will help Maddie make enough Uber money to pay off her tax debts.
Of course, “No Hard Feelings” throws in the “abandoned child” storyline to make Maddie look like she needs to be pitied. But make no mistake: “No Hard Feelings” is all about making Percy the real hero of the story. He is the only one who’s presented as having a pure heart. He is lied to and unfairly manipulated by a greedy egomaniac and two very twisted parents, who are let off the hook way too easily in this stagnant and putrid film.
The supporting characters in “No Hard Feelings” are mostly sounding boards for Maddie’s insecurities. Her only two friends are a couple of co-workers at Charters: Jim (played by Scott MacArthur) and his pregnant wife Sara (played by Natalie Morales) are having their own financial problems because they can’t afford their own place and are living with Jim’s parents. Jim and Sara know about Maddie’s “sex for a Buick” deal.
The so-called jokes in “No Hard Feelings” mostly fall flat. Early on in the movie, Maddie mentions that she’s gotten offers to sell her house to wealthy New York City residents, but she doesn’t want to sell her house to them because she’s biased against these types of people. Hasan Minhaj has a quick cameo as a smarmy real-estate agent named Doug Kahn, a former classmate of Maddie’s. The movie’s “joke” about Doug is that when he was an underage teen, he had a sex scandal with a teacher that was similar to the real-life scandal of Mary Kay Letourneau and Vili Fualaau.
After Maddie gets arrested for trying to steal back her repossessed car, she whines to her unnamed lawyer (played by Zahn McClarnon), who happens to be Native American, that she doesn’t want to give up her home to the people who want to take over her land. “Do you have any idea what that feels like?” she asks.
And then, she catches herself when she remembers she’s talking to a Native American, whose people experienced genocide and land stealing from white colonizers. “Of course, you do,” Maddie adds hastily. This lawyer is seen briefly again in one other inconsequential scene, which means he was only in the movie to be a setup for a joke about his Native American heritage.
Percy’s former nanny Jody (played by Kyle Mooney) is a supporting character who is shown briefly in the movie for no other reason but to be the target of homophobic-tinged jokes about gay men. Even though Jody is no longer Percy’s nanny, he’s still very concerned about Percy’s well-being. Because Maddie is relentlessly crass and rude, she has to make a snide comment implying that Jody, as a male nanny, might be involved in pedophilia and might be sexually attracted to Percy.
Percy is an aspiring musician, who spends a lot of time alone practicing on his electronic keyboards and playing video games. He also volunteers at an animal shelter, where Maddie goes to meet an unsuspecting Percy, under the ruse of wanting to adopt a dog. There’s a dour manager at the animal shelter named Crispin (played by Jordan Mendoza), who has some mildly amusing scenes, but Crispin is one of many supporting characters in “No Hard Feelings” that have no depth.
Lawrence has skilled comedic timing in many of her scenes. The problem is that her dialogue and the movie’s scenarios are so horrible or formulaic, it doesn’t matter how good her acting is in the movie (and her acting isn’t that great), it’s all cancelled out by this barrage of mind-numbing and often dull comedy. There’s a really good scene where Maddie and Percy have dinner together at a restaurant, and she pressures him to spontaneously start playing a piano that’s in the room. But that type of scene is few and far in between in this tacky and unimaginative movie that is ultimately a big step down and a total embarrassment for Oscar winner Lawrence.
Columbia Pictures will release “No Hard Feelings” in U.S. cinemas on June 23, 2023. A sneak preview of the movie was held in select U.S. cinemas on June 17, 2023.
Culture Representation: Taking place primarily in New York City, the comedy/drama film “Here Today” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans and Asians) representing the middle-class.
Culture Clash: A widowed senior citizen, who works as a TV comedy writer, has early stages of dementia and is afraid to tell anyone until he meets a feisty female singer who becomes his unexpected friend.
Culture Audience: “Here Today” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching old-fashioned movies with flat comedy and overly formulaic drama.
There used to be a time when a tedious cornball movie like “Here Today” would have been lapped up by movie audiences like hungry pets happy to get stale, leftover scraps. But in this day and age, when viewers have so many more and much better entertainment options, “Here Today” is the equivalent of food that’s years past its expiration date that the filmmakers are trying pass off as appealing and fresh. The movie is filled with outdated stereotypes and terrible jokes, clumsily paired with heavy-handed melodrama that’s too manipulative to come across as believable.
Billy Crystal is the star, director and co-writer of “Here Today,” which was co-written by Alan Zweibel. Crystal has been in many better-quality movies, some of which are considered classics. But maybe Crystal was just too close to the material of “Here Today” to take a more constructively critical look at how out-of-touch and embarrassing this movie is for today’s audiences. And with a total running time of nearly two hours, “Here Today” suffers from overly indulgent editing, since some scenes definitely did not need to be in the movie.
It’s not a completely terrible film, but “Here Today” should have been so much better, considering the level of talent and experience that the main cast members have. Some of the cast members of “Here Today” put in valiant efforts to bring authenticity to their roles, while other cast members just coast by and recite their lines, with no seeming emotional connection to their characters. Crystal and “Here Today” co-star Tiffany Haddish are two of the movie’s producers, so they bear much of the responsibility for how disappointing this movie is.
It’s obvious that Crystal called in favors to some of his celebrity friends to make cameos in the movie. Sharon Stone, Kevin Kline, Barry Levinson and Bob Costas have small roles portraying themselves doing a live audience Q&A about a fictional movie. Itzhak Perlman appears briefly in an unrealistic scene where he’s shown playing violin outside a window because he happens to be a neighbor of Crystal’s “Here Today” character. But this type of stunt casting can’t save the film from being a mostly cringeworthy story that uses dementia as a way to make Crystal’s main character look more sympathetic.
In “Here Today,” Crystal plays widower Charlie Burnz, a longtime, successful entertainment writer in New York City. Charlie currently works for a cable TV sketch comedy series called “This Just In,” which is supposed to be a lot like “Saturday Night Live.” Charlie has been working for “This Just In” for years and has previously been a Broadway playwright and a movie screenwriter. He’s won several of the entertainment industry’s highest accolades (including an Emmy Award and a Tony Award), but he’s been having writer’s block on a memoir that he wants to dedicate to his late wife, who died about 25 years ago.
Charlie is the oldest person on the “This Just In” writing team, which consists of people in their 20s and 30s, mostly white males. However, the stiff and unfunny jokes that these staff writers come up with sound exactly like what they are—pathetic attempts to be “hip” and written by people old enough to be these staff writers’ parents and grandparents. This movie has no self-awareness at how bad these jokes are, because there are several unrealistic scenes of people laughing and clapping at boring and dumb jokes that wouldn’t even pass muster on a no-budget, amateur comedy channel on YouTube.
Even though Charlie is at an age when most people are retired, Charlie’s age isn’t what bothers him. He’s got a health problem that he’s very ashamed of having: early stages of dementia. And he’s hiding his dementia from everyone he knows, except for his trusted therapist Dr. Vidor (played by Anna Deavere Smith), who gently advises Charlie to eventually tell his family about his dementia.
In the beginning of the movie, Charlie follows his usual routine of getting up and going to work. But there are signs that he forgets everyday things (such as, the show’s writers have their meetings on Mondays), and he’s haunted by memories of a tragedy from his past. These memories come back in bits and pieces throughout the story until the entire truth is eventually revealed.
As soon as viewers find out that Charlie has a strained relationship with his two adult children (who are both supposed to be in their mid-30s) and that his kids don’t talk about their mother to Charlie, it’s easy to figure out that the death of Charlie’s wife has a lot to do with the hard feelings that Charlie’s children have toward him. The movie has several flashbacks depicting Charlie’s memories of the relationship that he had with his wife Carrie (played by Louisa Krause), a painter artist whom Charlie met on a beach in 1986, when he was in his late 30s and she was in her 20s. Carrie died when the children were about 8 to 11 years old.
Charlie’s first child is a mild-mannered architect named Rex (played by Penn Badgley), who longs for Charlie’s approval, but doesn’t often get the praise and attention from Charlie that Rex is seeking. Rex is married to a woman named Sophie, and they have a son named Harry (played by Grayson Eddey), who’s about 7 or 8 years old. Sophie and Harry are barely in the movie, they don’t have any significant lines, and these two characters aren’t even listed in the movie’s end credits.
Charlie’s second child is uptight and judgmental Francine (played by Laura Benanti), who is a middle school teacher. Francine has an even more fractured relationship with Charlie than her brother Rex does. She avoids speaking with and visiting Charlie as much as she can.
Francine and her husband Larry (played by Charlie Pollock) have an adopted daughter named Lindsay (played by Audrey Hsieh), who’s about 12 or 13 years old. Lindsay adores Charlie and is aware that her mother’s feelings toward him aren’t as warm. Francine can no longer avoid Charlie in the near future, because he’s been invited to Lindsay’s upcoming bat mitzvah.
Francine’s hard feelings toward her father go beyond the fact that she feels he let his career take priority over being a good parent. Francine is particularly wary of the women who might come into Charlie’s life. As Charlie eventually reveals in later in the story, Francine has difficulty accepting any possible stepmother, because after Carrie died, Charlie had meaningless flings with several younger women. And workaholic widower Charlie also left much of the child rearing to a series of nannies.
And so, when Charlie starts hanging out with a boisterous, free-spirited aspiring singer named Emma Payge (played by Haddish), who’s young enough to be Charlie’s daughter, it doesn’t sit too well with Francine. Emma and Charlie met on a blind “date” because Charlie donated a lunch date with himself as part of a charity auction. Emma is predictably supposed to be the opposite of Charlie. She plays the role of someone who gets Charlie to see his life differently and helps him out of his emotional rut.
One of the biggest problems with “Here Today” is its subtle and not-so-subtle tone of racial condescension. For example, this charity auction (which is never seen in the movie) is mentioned as a fundraising event for “inner city libraries.” Of course, “inner city” is code in Hollywood movies for a place populated mostly by low-income people of color. And as soon as the words “inner city” are mentioned in this movie, you just know that the person who’s meeting Charlie for this lunch date is going have the negative stereotypes of being a crude and unsophisticated person of color.
Playing crude and unsophisticated characters is Haddish’s specialty, since she keeps perpetuating racially demeaning depictions of how a lot of racist people think African American women are supposed to be. The filmmakers show this racial condescension from the first moments that Emma appears on screen for this lunch date. It’s basically a scene where Emma is ignorant and so happy to be in a nice restaurant that she orders several of the more high-priced items on the menu.
The movie keeps portraying Emma as having a “from the ‘hood” mentality, with a lower intelligence level than the white people whom she interacts with in this story. It’s why the movie keeps showing Emma shoveling food in her mouth and giving constant “mmm-hmm” remarks when she’s eating, as if she can’t possibly know what it’s like to have good meals on a regular basis.
Emma performs cabaret-styled rock and pop tunes with her band. They’re struggling because they mostly perform in subways for money. And Emma doesn’t seem to have a day job. But just because she’s an aspiring entertainer doesn’t mean she’s taken the time to be knowledgeable about the entertainment business.
When Emma first meets Charlie for the lunch date, she says, “I don’t even know who the hell you are,” and she says that she’s never heard of “This Just In” or any of his award-winning work. Keep in mind that Emma is supposed to be in the entertainment business, albeit as a struggling singer. Her ignorance about a long-running comedy TV show that’s filmed in New York City is just one of many examples of how the movie makes Emma look less than smart.
Emma says that the only reason she’s on this lunch date is because her actor ex-boyfriend, who’s a big fan of Charlie’s, actually paid for it in the auction. And because this ex-boyfriend cheated on Emma, she “stole” the lunch date, out of revenge and spite. Charlie’s ego gets bruised a little bit when Emma tells him that the final auction price for this date was only $22, not $2,200 as Charlie assumed it was.
And just so viewers know early on that Emma has no sexual interest in Charlie, she rudely tells him during the lunch date how he wouldn’t be able to handle her if she were his lover: “I’d break your back, old man,” Emma smugly says. “I’d have you laid out dead, with a smile on your face.” Emma constantly calls Charlie “old man” throughout the movie, to the point where it gets very annoying.
And because “Here Today” has to have some ridiculous slapstick, Emma finds out too late during the luncheon that she’s allergic to the seafood that she ate. And so, there’s a scene with some very tacky visual effects of Emma with puffed-up lips and a swollen face. And because she has to be the stereotype of a loud-mouthed black woman, Emma’s freakout at the restaurant and her trip to the hospital emergency room are filled with her wailing and other hysterics.
In case it isn’t made clear that Emma is supposed to have a “ghetto” mentality, the movie makes a point of mentioning that she doesn’t have health insurance and she pulls a con game so Charlie will pay her hospital bill. A concerned Charlie accompanied Emma to the hospital. But he’s in for a shock when a hospital employee tells Charlie that Emma said that Charlie adopted her from Kenya and that Charlie would pay her hospital bill. And so, Charlie is now stuck paying the bill, which totals about $1,700.
Emma feels bad about the lie and later tells Charlie that she’ll pay him back for the entire bill, but Charlie says that she doesn’t have to do that. Since this movie is filled with racial condescension, Charlie accepts Emma excuse for why she lied to get him to pay her hospital bill. Emma tells Charlie: “I thought it would be cool to have a white dad.” Somewhere, Gary Coleman and Emmanuel Lewis are cringing.
Emma’s buffoonery continues when, after she checks out of the hospital, Emma ends up in Charlie’s home, with her trousers pulled down low enough for her butt to be partially exposed. It’s because Charlie is giving Emma an injection of the epinephrine that she was prescribed to treat her allergic reaction. Predictably, Emma does more hollering in this scene too. The filmmakers want viewers to believe that Emma has no one else in her life who could give her this injection but an old man she barely knows and who got scammed into paying her hospital bill.
Some people might think this butt injection scene is hilarious, but Haddish just looks like a foolish participant in this “shuck and jive” setup, which seems to be the filmmakers’ intention. Believe this: No one was asking for a movie showing Billy Crystal giving a butt injection to Tiffany Haddish. No one. Except for people who want to see Haddish literally be the butt of the joke.
And so, it should come as no surprise that Emma has a large tattoo on one of her butt cheeks that reads “Slippery When Wet.” The tattoo and Charlie’s reaction to it also reek of the deliberate way that the filmmakers want to make Emma look “trashy” compared to the more “sophisticated” Charlie. It’s all just lazy and loathsome stereotyping.
The next time that Charlie sees Emma, she has shown up unannounced outside his apartment. Emma tells Charlie that, even though he said she didn’t have to pay him back, she wants to repay him for the hospital bill. And she’s brought the first installment of her payment.
This redemption of Emma is so that she can show up in Charlie’s life with another payment installment. And eventually, she and Charlie become friends and start going on platonic dates together. Emma notices how forgetful Charlie is and tells him that he can confide in her about what’s going on with him.
And so, Charlie eventually tells Emma about his dementia. He also makes it clear to Emma that he’s not ready to tell his family or co-workers about his dementia. But since the movie wants Emma to be a “big mouth,” it’s easy to predict if she will be able to keep Charlie’s dementia a secret or not.
It seems that one of the main reasons why Haddish took this movie role was so that she could showcase her mediocre singing. She has some scenes where Emma performs cover songs in a way that’s not like, “Wow, this person should be a superstar singer,” but more like, “It’s easy to see why this singer is stuck performing in subways, dive bars and on sidewalks.”
At Lindsay’s bat mitzvah, Emma has to make the party about herself. Emma says the party has gotten too boring for her, so she gets up on stage and tries to be like Janis Joplin by leading a sing-along of “Piece of My Heart.” It’s a racially stereotypical scene meant to show how a black person with rhythm has to teach awkwardly dancing white people how to have a good time.
And since the movie can’t get enough of showing how petty and immature Emma can be, at one point in the movie, Emma randomly sees her most recent ex-boyfriend, whose name is Dwayne St. John (played by Nyambi Nyambi), and she decides to get revenge on him. This encounter happens after Emma and her band have performed near a pier, with Charlie in the small crowd watching the performance.
When Emma sees Dwayne, she puts Charlie in an awkward situation by making Charlie pretend that he’s her lover, just so Emma can make Dwayne jealous. Dwayne is star-struck by Charlie, and Emma offers to take a photo of Dwayne with Charlie, using Dwayne’s phone. But instead of taking a photo of Dwayne and Charlie together, Emma takes photos of herself. As she hands the phone back to Dwayne, she laughs and give him the middle finger.
Charlie isn’t above being a selfish boor either. There’s a very problematic scene in the movie where Charlie gets annoyed with one of the “This Just In” stars named Roger (played by Matthew Broussard), who has a habit of pronouncing the wrong inflections when saying certain words. It’s a habit that irritates Charlie because he doesn’t like to hear the words that he’s written pronounced incorrectly.
Instead of talking to Roger about it privately, which most respectful and emotionally mature adults would do, Charlie has a meltdown over it on live TV. Charlie goes on an epic rant and interrupts Roger on the soundstage, on camera, while Roger is doing a sketch similar to “Weekend Update” on “Saturday Night Live.” During this rant, where Charlie lectures Roger on how to pronounce words, Charlie calls Roger a “dumb turd,” and then gets the entire studio audience to loudly chant “dumb turd” with him. It’s absolutely cruel and humiliating bullying.
The scene is played for laughs, with Charlie’s granddaughter Lindsay even laughing about it while she watches this nauseating spectacle on TV in her home. At first, Charlie’s co-workers backstage are shocked by his on-camera outburst, but then they start guffawing about it as if it’s the funniest thing they’ve ever seen. And Charlie’s unprofessional meltdown gets their approval even more when they find out that it’s gone viral on social media.
This blanket approval of Charlie’s obnoxious bullying of a co-worker is one of the many ways that “Here Today” looks out of touch with today’s reality. This type of public belittling of a co-worker might have been acceptable in Crystal’s heyday, but it’s not acceptable today. In reality, Charlie would be rightfully dragged on social media for it and would probably be suspended or fired.
Charlie’s toxic bullying, which has no justification, is even more loathsome because it’s over something very petty. Maybe Charlie would’ve gotten away with this degradation of a co-worker if it hadn’t been so public. But he did it on live TV, with millions of people watching. In real life, there’s no way someone in Charlie’s position would be largely celebrated by the public for this type of bullying.
And that’s why it rings hollow that the movie has an unnecessary subplot of Charlie being a mentor to a shy, young staff writer named Darrell (played by Andrew Durand), whose skit ideas are almost never used on the show. There are a few scenes in the movie where Charlie gives Darrell some pep talks to boost Darrell’s confidence. It’s meant to make Charlie look like a caring person, but observant viewers will notice that Charlie bonds with Darrell only because Charlie thinks they’re both underappreciated in their jobs.
“Here Today” is such a rambling and frequently unfocused movie that the tone is all over the place. At times, it wants to be a slapstick comedy, while other times it wants to be a comedy propelled by verbal jokes. It’s too bad that many of the jokes are dull and absolutely horrible. And in an attempt to liven up the film with some drama, the last 15 minutes of the movie get very heavy-handed to contrive a situation that you just know is supposed to bring everyone together.
Emma is never depicted as a whole person with a life independent of Charlie. Her home life is never shown because her character was written to be Charlie’s subservient sidekick. The most that viewers will find out about Emma’s background is in a scene where she tells Charlie that her parents were both singers and are currently living in Durham, North Carolina.
Emma describes her parents as what Ashford & Simpson would be like if Ashford & Simpson weren’t rich and famous. The movie makes it look like Emma’s dream is to become a famous singer, and she gets an opportunity that would be a big career boost for her. But then, she makes a decision that fits this movie’s racially condescending narrative.
Crystal’s acting in “Here Today” is much better than his direction or screenwriting. Still, he’s not doing anything new in this movie, because he’s played selfish and sarcastic characters many times before. Haddish is doing another version of the crass characters she always plays in movies and TV. Badgley doesn’t have much to work with in this movie, since his Rex character is blandly written.
Benanti is the cast member who does the best in making her Francine character look the most authentic. Francine might not be the most likable character in the story, but viewers can understand why she acts in the way that she does. Most people would be bitter too if they had a self-absorbed parent like Charlie.
To its credit, “Here Today” has some good cinematography when showing scenic parts of New York City, such as the Manhattan skyline and Hudson Yards. But good cinematography is wasted when the story is so faulty. One of the ways that “Here Today” is unbalanced is how it shows that because Charlie feels guilty about being an emotionally absent father, he tries to make up for it by being a devoted grandfather to Lindsay. However, there’s no explanation for why Charlie is not shown spending any time with his other grandchild Harry, who is Rex’s son.
Why even bother having this grandson character at all when this child is barely seen in the movie and isn’t even in the narrative of Charlie trying to redeem himself with his family? The impression that viewers will get is that Charlie heavily favors one grandchild over another, which defeats the redemption narrative that he’s supposed to be a good grandfather. And the overall impression that “Here Today” leaves is that this misguided movie isn’t too concerned about giving supporting characters much depth because this movie is ultimately Crystal’s vanity project.
Stage 6 Films released “Here Today” in U.S. cinemas on May 7, 2021.
The following is a combination of press releases from HBO Max:
HBO Max — the upcoming WarnerMedia streaming platform that launched this week — has acquired the exclusive U.S. subscription-video-on-demand rights to the hit comedy Young Sheldon in a deal with Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution. HBO Max is also the streaming home of the entire library of The Big Bang Theory, the longest-running multicamera comedy in television history; all 279 episodes of Big Bang are available on the streamer now.
“We now feel like our Big Bang offering is complete,” said Kevin Reilly, chief content officer, HBO Max, president TNT, TBS, and TruTV. “We are so proud to be the home of this beloved franchise and the place where new and existing fans can learn about young Sheldon Cooper’s roots.”
“In order for Sheldon Cooper to visit his younger self, he would need to manipulate spacetime. All you actually need is HBO Max,” said Young Sheldon creators/executive producers Chuck Lorre and Steven Molaro. “We are so pleased that Young Sheldon will once again be reunited with his future self on HBO Max, and we are excited for fans, new and old, to be able to binge both The Big Bang Theory and Young Sheldon for the first time.”
Young Sheldon is currently the number-one comedy on network television with total viewers, Teens, and all key 25-54 demos. The series has averaged more than 11.4 million viewers per week during the 2019–20 season to date (11,424,000 actual P2+), according to Most Current ratings information from Nielsen, +34% more viewers than the next-largest comedy with total viewers.
For 12 years on The Big Bang Theory, audiences came to know the iconic, eccentric and extraordinary Sheldon Cooper. The single-camera, half-hour comedy Young Sheldon gives viewers the chance to meet him in childhood, as he embarks on his innocent, awkward and hopeful journey toward the man he will become.
For young Sheldon Cooper, it isn’t easy growing up in East Texas. Being a once-in-a-generation mind capable of advanced mathematics and science isn’t always helpful in a land where church and football are king. And while the vulnerable, gifted and somewhat naïve Sheldon deals with the world, his very normal family must find a way to deal with him. His father, George, is struggling to find his way as a high school football coach and as father to a boy he doesn’t understand. Sheldon’s mother, Mary, fiercely protects and nurtures her son in a town where he just doesn’t fit in. Sheldon’s older brother, Georgie, does the best he can in high school, but it’s tough to be cool when you’re in the same classes with your odd 9-year-old brother. Finally, there’s Sheldon’s twin sister, Missy, who sometimes resents all the attention Sheldon gets, but also remains the one person who can reliably tell Sheldon the truth.
From Chuck Lorre Productions, Inc. in association with Warner Bros. Television, Young Sheldon is distributed by Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution. The series stars Iain Armitage as Young Sheldon, Zoe Perry, Lance Barber, Montana Jordan, Raegan Revord, with Annie Potts, and Jim Parsons as the voice of Sheldon. Chuck Lorre & Steven Molaro created the show and serve as executive producers with Steve Holland, Jim Parsons and Todd Spiewak. HBO Max Social
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HBO Max, the direct-to-consumer offering from WarnerMedia, announced today the greenlight of Homeschool Musical: Class of 2020. Inspired by Tony Award winning actress Laura Benanti’s (“My Fair Lady” and “She Loves Me” on Broadway, Younger, Supergirl, Nashville) online movement #SunshineSongs, in which she offered to be an audience for the students around the country whose spring musicals were cancelled because of COVID-19, this television event will give students the opportunity to sing and dance like the stars they are, from the safety of their homes.
Homeschool Musical: Class of 2020 will explore tried-and-true themes of classic teen movies through the totally unique lens of a world turned upside down by the global pandemic. The cast, featuring a diverse group of super talented student actors with compelling backstories, will play seniors from the same high school and while the pandemic may have shut down their school, the drama and romantic intrigue live on.
“As a mom of teenagers, I know that this time has been a struggle for them. High School seniors in particular have been hit hard by this pandemic, their dreams of homecoming, prom, spring performances and even graduation being cancelled,” said Jennifer O’Connell, executive vice president original non-fiction and kids programming. “Laura’s brilliant idea to give these kids an audience and a platform has blossomed into this unique opportunity for us to not only celebrate their talent, but to entertain many other families across the country sharing their experience.”
“Our school shows are more than just entertainment. At the very least, they bring our communities together to revel in the talent of our young artists. At their best, they are a life changing experience that these kids will bring with them into the rest of their lives,” saidBenanti. “I am thrilled that the #SunshineSongs initiative has put the spotlight on so many incredible young performers; grateful to World of Wonder for its grand vision and to HBO MAX for providing a global platform on which America’s youth can shine!”
Homeschool Musical: Class of 2020 is executive produced by Laura Benanti along with Randy Barbato, Fenton Bailey, and Tom Campbell for World of Wonder Productions (RuPaul’s Drag Race), and Leland (Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez, RuPaul’s Drag Race) will write and produce the original songs and score.
About HBO Max
HBO Max is WarnerMedia’s direct-to-consumer offering. With 10,000 hours of curated premium content anticipated at launch, HBO Max will offer powerhouse programming for everyone in the home, bringing together HBO, a robust slate of new original series, key third-party licensed programs and movies, and fan favorites from Warner Media’s rich library including Warner Bros., New Line, DC, CNN, TNT, TBS, truTV, Turner Classic Movies, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, Crunchyroll, Rooster Teeth, Looney Tunes and more. Sign up for updates at HBOMax.com.
About WarnerMedia
WarnerMedia is a leading media and entertainment company that creates and distributes premium and popular content from a diverse array of talented storytellers and journalists to global audiences through its consumer brands including: HBO, HBO Now, HBO Max, Warner Bros., TNT, TBS, truTV, CNN, DC, New Line, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, Turner Classic Movies and others. WarnerMedia is part of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T).
About Laura Benanti
In the midst of an illustrious career spanning Broadway, film, and television, Tony® Award-winning actress, singer and author, Laura Benanti now brings a longstanding dream to life as she gears up to release her new solo album with Sony Music Masterworks this year. She recently released a single, a cover of “Sucker” along with a moving video donating 100% of her earnings to FoodCorps. Additionally, on the heels of her viral social media campaign, #SunshineSongs, Laura debuted the Sunshine Songs Concert series to bring joy through music to senior living communities, aging loved ones isolated in their homes, children’s hospitals, and beyond. With starring roles on Broadway ranging from the My Fair Lady revival and Steve Martin’s Meteor Shower to She Loves Me, and the title role in Gypsy for which Laura garnered a Tony® Award (one of five career nominations to date). Meanwhile, her performance in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown garnered her a Drama Desk Award and Outer Critics Circle Award. Simultaneously, she enchanted audiences on the small screen, appearing on Younger, Supergirl, Nashville, The Good Wife, Nurse Jackie and her hilarious portrayal of First Lady Melania Trump on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert (among many others). In addition to films including Worth alongside Michael Keaton, Amy Ryan and Stanley Tucci and the upcoming “Here Today” alongside Billy Crystal and Tiffany Haddish, Laura recently released a hilarious book for Moms (co-written with her friend and Metropolitan Opera Star Kate Mangiameli) entitled “M is for MAMA (and also Merlot): A Modern Mom’s ABCs” available now at Barnes and Noble. Benanti is represented by UTA and Untitled. About World of Wonder
For more than two decades, award-winning production company World of Wonder has introduced audiences to new worlds, talent and ideas that have shaped culture. Programming highlights include: Emmy® Award winning “RuPaul’s Drag Race” (VH1/Logo), “Million Dollar Listing” LA & NY (Bravo), “Dancing Queen” (Netflix), “Big Freedia: Queen of Bounce” (Fuse), and “Gender Revolution: A Journey with Katie Couric” (National Geographic); award-winning films and documentaries including “Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures,” “Menendez: Blood Brothers,” “Inside Deep Throat,” “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” “I Am Britney Jean,” “In Vogue: The Editor’s Eye,” “Carrie Fisher’s Wishful Drinking,” “Monica in Black and White,” Emmy-winning “The Last Beekeeper,” and Emmy-winning “Out of Iraq.” Seven of WOW’s films have premiered at the Sundance Film festival including “Becoming Chaz” and “Party Monster.” World of Wonder has also created a substantial digital footprint with its YouTube channel WOWPresents (1M+ subs), SVOD digital platform WOW Presents Plus, along with an award-winning blog, The WOW Report. World of Wonder’s bi-annual RuPaul’s DragCon is the world’s largest drag culture convention, welcoming 100,000 attendees across LA and NYC in 2019 and expanding internationally to the UK in 2020. Co-founders Randy Barbato and Fenton Bailey authored The World According to Wonder, celebrating decades of production, which can be found online at http://worldofwonder.net/. Randy and Fenton were honored with the IDA Pioneer Award in December 2014, celebrating exceptional achievement, leadership, and vision in the nonfiction and documentary community, named to Variety’s Reality Leaders List in 2017, and chosen for the OUT100 list in 2018 for their trailblazing work in the LGBTQ+ community. World of Wonder was also selected for Realscreen’s 2018 Global 100 list, which recognizes the top international non-fiction and unscripted production companies working in the industry today. World of Wonder creates out of a historic building/gallery space in the heart of Hollywood.
About Leland
Brett McLaughlin, aka Leland, is a Golden Globe nominated songwriter, composer, executive producer and prominent figure in the LGBTQ+ community who has contributed to some of pop music’s most influential releases of the past few years. As a songwriter, he has collaborated with Selena Gomez (‘Rare’ and ‘Fetish’), Troye Sivan (Youth, Bloom, My My My!, Take Yourself Home), BTS (Louder Than Bombs), Ariana Grande, (Dance To This), Carrie Underwood (End Up With You), Charli XCX (1999), Lauv & Troye Sivan (I’m So Tired) and many more. Mclaughlin composed the score and wrote 12 original songs for the Netflix Original Movie ‘Sierra Burgess Is A Loser’ as well as executive producing the soundtrack. Other projects include composing musicals for the Emmy Award Winning ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ and co-writing “Revelation” with Troye Sivan and Jonsi for ‘Boy Erased’, a biographical film about LGBTQ+ conversion therapy.
The following is a press release from the Tony Awards:
Some of the world’s biggest stars from stage and screen will appear at the 73rd Annual Tony Awards. The list of names announced includes Darren Criss, Tina Fey, Sutton Foster, Samuel L. Jackson, Regina King, Laura Linney, Audra McDonald, Ben Platt, Billy Porter, Andrew Rannells, LaTanya Richardson Jackson and Michael Shannon. More presenters will be announced soon.
The Tony Awards telecast will feature an incredible line up of celebrity presenters and musical performances for Broadway’s biggest night.
James Corden will return to host the American Theatre Wing’s 2019 Tony Awards, which will be broadcast live from Radio City Music Hall in New York City on CBS. The three-hour program will air on Sunday, June 9th 8:00 – 11:00 p.m. (ET/PT time delay). The Tony Awards are presented by The Broadway League and the American Theatre Wing.
You can also watch the Tony Awards online with CBS All Access. More info at cbs.com/all-access.
June 5, 2019 UPDATE: A second round of artists has been added to appear at THE 73rd ANNUAL TONY AWARDS(R), live from the historic Radio City Music Hall in New York City, Sunday, June 9 (8:00-11:00 PM, live ET/delayed PT) on the CBS Television Network. The star-studded lineup includes Sara Bareilles, Laura Benanti, Abigail Breslin, Danny Burstein, Kristin Chenoweth, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Josh Groban, Danai Gurira, Jake Gyllenhaal, Chris Jackson, Shirley Jones, Jane Krakowski, Judith Light, Lucy Liu, Aasif Mandvi, Sienna Miller, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Catherine O’Hara, Kelli O’Hara, Karen Olivo, Anthony Ramos, Marisa Tomei, Aaron Tveit, Samira Wiley and BeBe Winans.
Emmy and Tony Award winner James Corden will host the 2019 Tony Awards for the second time. As previously announced, Darren Criss, Tina Fey, Sutton Foster, Samuel L. Jackson, LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Regina King, Laura Linney, Audra McDonald, Ben Platt, Billy Porter, Andrew Rannells and Michael Shannon will also take part in Broadway’s biggest night.
The TONY Awards, which honors theater professionals for distinguished achievement on Broadway, has been broadcast on CBS since 1978. This year marks the 73rd anniversary of the TONY Awards, which were first held on April 6, 1947 at the Waldorf Astoria’s Grand Ballroom. The ceremony is presented by Tony Award Productions, which is a joint venture of the Broadway League and the American Theatre Wing, which founded the Tonys.
Ricky Kirshner and Glenn Weiss of White Cherry Entertainment will return as executive producers. Weiss will also serve as director for the 20th consecutive year. Ben Winston is a producer.
June 6, 2019 UPDATE:
The Tony Awards telecast will feature performances by the casts of “Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of the Temptations”; “Beetlejuice”; “The Cher Show”; “Choir Boy”; “Hadestown”; “Kiss Me, Kate”; “Oklahoma!”; “The Prom” and “Tootsie.” The evening will also feature a special performance by Tony Award winning-actress Cynthia Erivo.