Are You Ready to Book Your Spot in ‘Theater Camp’?

July 13, 2023

jmunney Cinema, Movie Reviews , , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment

Which one’s Theater and which one’s Camp? (CREDIT: SearchlightPictures/Screenshot)

Starring: Molly Gordon, Ben Platt, Noah Galvin, Jimmy Tatro, Nathan Lee Graham, Ayo Edebiri, Owen Thiele, Caroline Aaron, Amy Sedaris

Directors: Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman

Running Time: 93 Minutes

Rating: PG-13 for Middle Schoolers Dramatizing Adult Themes

Release Date: July 14, 2023 (Theaters)

What’s It About?: If you’ve ever ventured to a certain mountain range in northern New York and thought that there should be an organization called “AdirondACTS,” then Theater Camp is the movie for you! It’s a mockumentary whose production goes off the rails immediately. While watching a middle school performance of Bye Bye Birdie, AdirondACTS founder Joan Rubinsky (Amy Sedaris) has a seizure that puts her in a coma, which leaves the camp in the not-so-capable hands of her vlogger bro son Troy (Jimmy Tatro). The counselors and campers pretty much ignore him, as they’ve got plenty of drama of their own to deal with, both in terms of the shows they’re staging and the interpersonal powder kegs they’re sitting on. In particular, there are co-dependent besties Amos Klobuchar (Ben Platt) and Rebecca-Diane (Molly Gordon), who have spent just about every summer of their lives here as either students or teachers. And the question looming everything is: can this motley band of thespians find the gumption to keep everything afloat before the evil rich neighbor camp buys them out?

What Made an Impression?: Everything Is Acting: If you believe that the stage is more essential to life than breathing, then you really ought to watch Theater Camp as soon as possible. Or actually on second thought, maybe you should avoid it like the plague, unless, that is, you can bear some light ribbing about your greatest passion. If you do indeed take acting deathly seriously, you’ll probably recognize yourself in nearly every character in this movie. Hopefully, you can keep the lampooning in perspective and lap up the teasing. If you somehow don’t recognize the humor, well, you might want to head to a psychologist for a diagnosis.
A Stranger Lurks: For any potential viewers who aren’t exactly theater obsessives, Troy can serve as a potential surrogate character into the action. Anyone familiar with Jimmy Tatro (via Netflix’s American Vandal, ABC’s Home Economics, or his own YouTube channel) already knows that he’s perfected a certain incorrigible type: the 21st Century Slacker Bro Entrepreneur. If we’re talking generations, he’s a millennial with a Gen Z soul. Troy genuinely tries to live up to his mom’s legacy and connect with the kids, but they’re essentially living on different planets. But even though he’s a screwup who’s way out of his depth, he’s a straight shooter who just can’t give up on his optimism.
Authenticity in Their Bones: If you recruited all of the most intense kids at every middle school drama club in the Northeast for some sort of real life AdirondACTS and then made a documentary about it, I worry that it would quickly turn into a neurotic disaster. But I suspect that co-directors Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman recreated the camp experience as much as they possibly could for their cast and crew, and the results speak for themselves. Every single role is so fully realized. There’s no question that each and every actor thought deeply about their characters’ allergies, tax returns, and dream journals. Sometimes, a movie just had to exist to capture a certain group of people, and Theater Camp is one of those movies.

Theater Camp is Recommended If You Like: Waiting for Guffman, Wet Hot American Summer

Grade: 4 out of 5 Spotlights

‘Dear Evan Hansen’ Made Me Feel a Lot of Very Different Emotions, and I Can Think of Worse Ways to Spend an Evening

September 21, 2021

jmunney Cinema, Movie Reviews , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Dear Evan Hansen (CREDIT: Erika Doss/Universal Pictures)

Starring: Ben Platt, Kaitlyn Dever, Amy Adams, Julianne Moore, Amandla Stenberg, Nik Dodani, Danny Pino, Colton Ryan

Director: Stephen Chbosky

Running Time: 137 Minutes

Rating: PG-13 for Thematic Material Involving Suicide and Mental Health Struggles

Release Date: September 24, 2021 (Theaters)

My brain is so frazzled by Dear Evan Hansen, and I just don’t know what to say. Part of that is due to the movie itself, which offers an occasionally offbeat and fairly frightening mix of tones. And it’s also certainly a matter of the mocking buzz I encountered in the buildup to the film’s release. Sure, the trailer can be seen as too-earnest-for-its-own-good inspirational fluff. And yes, the hairstyling makes 27-year-old Ben Platt look ten years older instead of ten years younger. But I wanted to wait it out to discover what I actually thought about it myself. Maybe I would be won over by the earnestness! Or maybe I would find it just as ridiculous as it loudest naysayers. Or perhaps I could enjoy that ridiculousness in a campy fashion. So now that I’ve actually seen the movie itself … it hasn’t really cleared things up.

It does have a premise designed to keep plenty of audiences on edge, after all. Based on the 2015 stage musical of the same name, it’s about the anxiety-stricken teenage title character (Platt) who is given the therapy assignment of writing a letter to himself, which then gets mistaken as the suicide note of Connor (Colton Ryan), a classmate he barely knows. From there, the lie just keeps snowballing as Evan lets everyone believe that Connor was his best friend, and their story becomes a viral sensation that anyone who’s ever had mental health struggles can take solace in. I’m most impressed by DEH when it leans into its inherent discomfort. A waking nightmare threatens to envelop us all as Evan tries to explain the truth but Connor’s mom (Amy Adams) practically begs him to stick with the version of the story she so desperately wants to believe. This movie could have made us feel just as anxious as Evan does all the time if it had wanted to. Instead, it only does that occasionally, while also making us bawl up and heartily chuckle and just let everyone know that they’re not alone.

There were definitely parts of this flick that fully worked on me. The rendition of the signature song, “You Will Be Found,” had me unabashedly bawling. And Nik Dodani, who plays Evan’s “family friend” Jared, is making quite a name for himself as a mischievous little scamp. But I would’ve liked it if we had seen a bigger fallout from the truth finally coming out. And when it comes to movies about a lie regarding someone’s death spinning out of control, I must say that I much prefer the bracing dark comedy of the Robin Williams-starring World’s Greatest Dad. Anyway, my friend who I saw DEH with was won over completely, so it’s definitely for somebody. And in truth, parts of it are for parts of me.

So let’s get to the One Million Dollar Question: would I want Evan Hansen to write a “Dear Evan Hansen” letter to me? I think that would be fun! But only if we could tell the truth (the whole truth!) from the get-go. Anything else would be too stressful.

Dear Evan Hansen is Recommended If: You Think You’re Going to Love It, But Also If You Think You’re Going to Hate It, Because Our Opinions Will Be Found

Grade: 3 out of 5 Letters