Posts Tagged ‘Patti Harrison’

THEATER CAMP: 3 STARS. “sweet satire that applauds theater kid culture.”

Set at an underfunded theater camp in New York State’s Adirondack Mountains, “Theater Camp,” now playing in cinemas, is a mockumentary about a place where “where every kid picked last in gym finally makes the team.”

Written by, and starring Ben Platt and Molly Gordon, two theater camp kids who made it to Broadway in real life, the film takes place at Camp AdirondACTS, a summer school for theatrical wannabes. When owner Joan Rubinsky (Amy Sedaris) suffers a seizure and falls into a coma during a production of “Bye Bye Birdie,” the future of the camp is thrown into question.

With Joan in the ICU, her dim-witted business vlogger son Troy (Jimmy Tatro) takes over. Faced with running the nearly bankrupt camp, he grapples with closing down his mother’s life project, or selling the land to their neighbor, the infinitely fancier Camp Lakeview.

There may be financial ruin on the horizon, but the show still must go on; there is a season to run and students to teach. With no idea how to do either, Troy turns to eccentric acting teachers Amos (Ben Platt), Rebecca-Diane (Gordon) and production manager Glenn (Noah Galvin) to run things and put together a show-stopping musical to end the camp’s season. “We’re theater people,” says Glenn. “We know how to turn cardboard into gold.”

“Theater Camp” will work best for audiences who have a love of the Three S’s: Sondheim, singing and stagecraft. It’s a celebration of those who bow at the altar of Patti LuPone and spontaneously burst into song.

An update on the Judy and Mickey “let’s put on a show” trope, the movie is a musical underdog story that nails the vibe of the camp, a place for misfits who don’t fit in anywhere else. When it concentrates on the campers and their teachers—Nathan Lee Graham has a memorable cameo as an instructor who says, “You need to know that only three percent of people make it. The rest end up in a mental facility or in a Go-Go box in Hell’s Kitchen.”—it finds a pleasing mix of humor and sweetness.

When it gets deeper into the production of the final show, “Joan, Still,” the movie’s one-joke premise starts to wear thin.

A combination of loving portrayal of the camaraderie of theatre and edgy, awkward humor, “Theater Camp” is a balance of satire and cloying sweetness that applauds theater kid culture, but feels a bit too inside for a wide audience.

TOGETHER TOGETHER: 3 ½ STARS. “a different take on ‘When Harry Met Sally.’”

If I was to categorize “Together Together,” a new movie starring Ed Helms and now on V.O.D., I guess I’d have to create a new category, the non rom com. It’s a relationship comedy that has some, but not all, of the hallmarks of a romantic comedy, but walks its own path.

Helms is Matt, a 45-year-old single man who wants to start a family. When we first meet him he’s awkwardly interviewing 26-year-old millennial Anna (Patti Harrison) for the job of surrogate. She has snappy answers to his questions—Have you ever stolen anything?—and gets the job. Matt is eager to begin his new life as a single dad but Anna, who gave a baby up for adoption years before, sees it as a gig, a transaction with a $15,000 fee.

Divided into trimesters, as story unfolds Matt and Anna’s relationship grows. They share meals, watch “Friends,” which she has never seen, and take prenatal classes together. They even attend a kind of couple’s therapy, even though their relationship isn’t romantic. It’s more complicated than that. They aren’t a couple but their relationship is intimate on many levels and it leads to misunderstandings that threaten their personal and business relationship.

“Together Together” often feels like it is turning the corner to becoming a Hollywood rom com and then, just as often, does a u-turn. It constantly defies the traditional rom com journey, while allowing the characters to have an interesting connection.

Writer/director Nikole Beckwith has crafted a movie about a platonic relationship between a man and a woman, fringed with humour, melancholy and warmth. Helms brings his trademarked nerdy awkwardness to the role, expertly playing off Harrison’s more sardonic take on Anna. They are a compelling couple, even if they’re not actually a couple.

“Together Together” is a different take on “When Harry Met Sally,” providing an updated and rather sweet answer to that movie’s famous query, “Can men and women be friends or does sex always get in the way?”