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Review:
 Famous
director and playwright Nicky Rogan(Michael Keaton) is facing a
major dilemma. A major Red Sox fan, he's got to either miss the
sixth game of the 1986 world series or the opening of his latest
play. So he ponders this as he cheats on his soon-to-be-ex-wife
with his biggest backer(Bebe Neuwirth). He has to go to the final
dress rehearsal, so he makes a leisurely trip across town, making
the same conversation with what seems to be dozens of cabbies.
Yup, it's one of those philosophical movies about the nature of
life and why the Red Sox always lose.
Nicky has some other problems. One of them is Steven
Schwimmer(Robert Downey Jr.), the most evil theater critic in the
universe. He is so powerful, so evil, that he has to go to the
theater in disguise because otherwise he'd be killed. This is what
our hero's best friend Elliot Litvak(Griffin Dunne) has wanted to
do for years.
But before that comes more pressing worries: The star of the play,
Peter Redmond (Harris Yulin), has a memory-eating parasite in his
brain and can't remember his lines. Add to this daughter Laurel (Ari
Graynor), appears out of nowhere and announces that her mother
Lillian (Catherine O'Hara) is suddenly filing for divorce [with
the bedroom scene, we should have seen that coming].
With all these major movie stars running around, we should have
had something really amazing. But we don't. all we've got is
better-than-average sitcom, and although that's fine in and of
itself, with a cast like this, and a script by the great Don
DeLillo, we should have has sooo much more than we've got.
One can understand why it's been sitting on a shelf since the '05
Sundance film festival.
Eric Lurio
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