Something happened at my screening of The Debut that has never happened at a film I’ve been at before. Following an absolute stunner of a speech from Julianne Moore’s Mona Friedman (a sequence that all but assures Moore is going to get a nomination for the Best Actress Oscar this year, if not start the race as the clear frontrunner), the entire audience burst into spontaneous applause. I’ve had clapping at the climax of an action or superhero film. But after a speech in the first half of an unhinged comedy about a community theater production of a fictional musical? Yeah, that’s something special. And The Debut? Also something special.
One part My Fair Lady, one part Waiting for Guffman, and with more in common with the hit comedy Oh Mary! than one might think on first glance, The Debut is the story of Mona, a mousy housewife who ends up cast in a supporting role in a truly terrible fictional musical (Nosy Neighbors*) at the local community theater. She’s not a talent – at least not in the vein of the actress she is replacing, Serena Cherry (Broadway legend Bernadette Peters, no less), who thought her part was too small and left at the 11th hour – but she desperately wants to have this one little thing for herself. You see, her teenage twins want nothing to do with her and her husband, Howard (Patrick Fabian of Better Call Saul fame, once again playing a rich, egotistical man named Howard), may or may not be having an affair with her best friend. Mona just doesn’t have the confidence to rise to the occasion. Or, at least she doesn’t until the musical’s director, Jerry Blankenbuehler (a stellar Paul Giamatti) gets his claws into her.
*We were provided with faux playbills for Nosy Neighbors at our screening, complete with character bios, ads from places and things in the film, and a director’s note. It only added to the hilarity of the show and I hope that folks somehow can get a copy of the playbill when the film gets into wide release.
The film, written and directed by Jesse Eisenberg (who also takes on a minor role as one of the actors in the musical – complete with singing a truly awful song about how backed up he is because he hasn’t had sex in awhile), is genuinely hilarious. And cringey – especially as Mona begins to dive deeper and deeper into her character. With a movie like this one, it’s common to want to grasp for just what Eisenberg might be trying to send up with how truly out there the story starts to get – is he showing how utterly insane method actors can be? Or how demanding directors might unlock something within an actor, only to break them in the process and have to do damage control in the hopes of reining them back in? Or just the delicate nature of actors – once they get too in touch with their emotional core, they can’t help but to keep falling into a well of empathy for their character, for good and for ill? All of that could be true. There’s also a reading that it’s a commentary on how seriously community theater takes itself while being the lowest rung of the art form – while also showing us that we can learn more about ourselves from immersing ourselves in the lives of others.
Whatever you take away from the film, there’s two clear truths. The first is that Eisenberg is a truly exceptional writer/director – and that he creates projects that allow other actors to have the chance to shine. Last time it was giving Kieran Culkin the showy role that led him to an Oscar. This time, it’s writing a piece that centers a middle aged woman – a role that will undoubtedly lead to at least a nomination for Moore. And Giamatti? Well, he’s been on a tear of late, and he makes the most of Jerry, a tyrant at times, but one who understands that, at the end of the day, this is just community theater. Watching Moore and Giamatti bounce off one another throughout the film is one of the greatest joys of the piece, with the power dynamics between the pair changing throughout. While some of the story verges into the absurd, the emotional beats of the film stay rooted in reality thanks largely in part to their two performances.
I suspect The Debut won’t be for everyone. It definitely gets a bit out there, the performances can get a bit broad, and the subject matter won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. But with two stellar performances, a great script, and some hilariously bad (yet still well made) musical numbers, it’s well worth a look.
The Debut will be released December 11 in the US. The film was screened at the Chicago International Film Festival.
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