Arts
The Classic Story of Boy Meets Ira
A dialogue about Judd Apatow’s latest bromance, “Funny People.”
Still from “Funny People” starting Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen courtesy of Universal Pictures.
-
- |
-
- |
- |
- 17
This is the first entry in a dialogue about the films of Judd Apatow and the state of the romantic comedy among Double X Managing Editor Jessica Grose, Slate critic Troy Patterson, and Variety contributor Lael Loewenstein.
Hi Troy and Lael,
Judd Apatow has produced almost a dozen comedies in the past five years. We’re here to talk about the three he wrote and directed: Funny People, which premieres on Friday, along with its bawdy, bro-loving precursors: The 40-Year-Old Virgin from 2005 and Knocked Up from 2007. Both of the older movies were on TV Sunday night, leading me to an addendum to the Caine-Hackman Theory: At all times, there is a 100 percent statistical probability that a Judd Apatow-produced movie will be on cable.
Each of the three points in Apatow’s box-office bursting crown is a romantic comedy told from the male point of view. And as New York Times film critic Manohla Dargis puts it, each stars “a funny, smutty but sincere man-boy puzzling [his] way through adult heterosexual relations.”
She’s right—the man-boys of the Apatow universe are immature in a profound way. In The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Steve Carrell’s character still plays with action figures. In Knocked Up, Seth Rogen’s anti-hero is a mostly unemployed stoner. And now, in Funny People, Adam Sandler plays a wildly successful comedian who still dresses like a teenage boy and eats popsicles after banging groupies. In a movie within the movie, Sandler also plays a man who has been transformed into a baby, his gargantuan melon digitally attached to an infant’s body: a literal depiction of his inability to grow up.
Sandler’s character, 40-year-old George Simmons, has an existential crisis when he realizes that he is sick with a rare form of Leukemia. His choice in the face of this terrifying discovery won’t surprise anyone familiar with the Apatow oeuvre: Simmons befriends a much-younger struggling stand-up comic named Ira Wright, played by Rogen. In typical Apatow fashion, the homosocial love affair, or “bromance,” between George and Ira becomes the central relationship of the movie. Never mind that it has been marketed as a heterosexual romantic comedy; it’s their story line that follows the familiar romantic comedy arc: boy meets Ira, boy loses Ira, boy gets Ira.
If you agree with Katherine Heigl, who called Knocked Up “a little bit sexist” in Vanity Fair, you might see this relationship as a natural progression for Apatow, since his previous films left women increasingly on the sidelines. Double X founding editor Meghan O’Rourke wrote of the female leads in Knocked Up (played by Heigl and Apatow’s real-life wife, Leslie Mann), “It's as if women's inner worlds are entirely functional rather than playful and open.” This also holds true for the more fully fleshed-out character played by Catherine Keener in the 40-Year-Old Virgin. All three of these women are the enforcers of commitment and domesticity, and it is their job to corral the unruly boys, who get to have all the fun on-screen.
Jessica Grose is the managing editor of Double X and the co-author of Love, Mom: Poignant, Goofy, Brilliant Messages from Home. Click here to follow her on Twitter.
SNL: Equal Opportunity Objectifiers
Jon Hamm spent most of the Saturday Night Live episode he hosted last night shirtless.
Confessions of a Woman Comedy Writer
Allison Silverman accepts one from New York Women in Film & Television (and tells us why it's rare).
Comments
Thanks
By: Mengembalikan J... | Sat, 09/26/2009 - 12:37
Thanks for sharing, Bravo
Bisnis Internet | Mengembalikan Jati Diri Bangsa | Bisnis Tiket Pesawat | Kenali dan Kunjungi Objek Wisata di Pandeglang
Um... yes? That's just it???
By: Fuchsia | Thu, 09/10/2009 - 17:05
Jumping onto the bandwagon a bit late here, but I couldn’t resist pointing out the following: part of the problem I recognise in the Apatovian genre in relation to women is the very fact that Apatow does not create a misogynistic universe out of nowhere. He doesn’t have to - it already exists. Apatovia is merely an exaggerated version of the real world and this becomes all the more apparent when you talk to guys about the possible misogyny in the Apatow films, the comments below unfortunately offering up excellent examples.
To whit:
Clobbersaurus said: “I get the feeling that every time someone makes a movie it HAS to have a deep female character."
Well, yes, Clobbersaurus. Yes, every movie does have to have at least one deep female character in it. That is, I would say, truly necessary. After all, 50% of the real world’s population are actually women, so, unless the film takes place in a male monastery, I would say that featuring at least one female character that’s not a cardboard cut-out is indeed somewhat essential. Unless of course the makers of the film happen to be the kind of people that simply don’t perceive or register women as fully human…
Which brings me to what E. Craig:
“As a man, I can say Apatow's movies movies feel very "true." He captures a feeling men often have, whether or not it actually represent how they view women.”
Exactly. This is why the Apatovian world-view is worrisome – exactly because it reflects a reality in which men are encouraged to disregards female experience and dismiss female thoughts and feelings (or even the ability of women to truly be capable of thought or actually experience feelings). Through the comedic lenses it illustrates the misogyny still existent in modern society. I must admit to actually enjoying bromances – although those with actual Apatow involvement are my least favourite – but it is precisely this insight into the male psyche that I find troubling. As an aside, I feel I also ought to note that I am not fully sure how exactly somebody can have a certain feeling about a subject, without however having that feeling actually form part of the person’s “view” on said subject. That sounds suspiciously like cognitive dissonance to me…
Finally: “Had a woman made a similar movies about her own feelings toward men, I'm sure she would not be criticized nearly as much.”
You are right – chick-flicks are rarely criticised for their portrayal of men as ciphers. It is far more likely that the female characters engaging in an analysis of their relationship issues are branded with various negative tags… However, rarely (never actually!) have I come across the click-flick that bulldozers the complexities of the male protagonists. When are convincing male characters ever left out of the script? As far as I can see, (and I might be wrong) even in the worst offenders of the genre, such as the infamous Sex and the City (which I also enjoyed), fully fleshed-out male characters are juxtaposed to the female ones. Although the later might take centre-stage (they are after all the leads), never are the men in their lives treated as merely as cliches.
Family Values
By: Luxbot | Wed, 08/05/2009 - 21:38
Much has been made of Apatow’s deeply conservative streak. As Stephen Rodrick put it in a 2007 New York Times Magazine profile of Apatow, the director offers up “the kind of conservative morals the Family Research Council might embrace—if the humor weren't so filthy.” Perhaps Laura is a family values cipher, a nod to the importance of long-term heterosexual commitment.
Since when have conservative family values (honor your marriage, raise your kids right) been in the domicile of conservatives? Apatow is obviously committed to his family -- a trait that one can assign to either political or social leaning.
Reply to Usma3
By: reader2 | Sat, 08/01/2009 - 18:01
I understand your argument - that the sexes should be respecting each other, not tearing each other down. But your comments, and Apatow's films, do nothing but tear gender relationships apart.
"Is this is the American woman today: eye candy ( good to look at) but in the drive to outcompete and outperform men and prove their superiority, they loose their actual feminity and womanhood?"
Why is competing and performing automatically unfeminine and unwomanly? And why is it automatically directed at men - why can't women be successful in their own right, or in a way that might even enhance their realtionships? Who defines what's unfeminine and unwomanly, anyhow? This argument is really just a stand in for "women who are successful are threats to men, so we'll call them unfeminine." Recently, that ancient argument has gone even further with the whole "American women are just eye candy - so successful they're good for nothing." Ie, women are good for nothing that men want them to be good for, which I guess must be stroking men's egos, fading into the background, and serving men's every whims, because certainly helping provide for the family, helping raise the kids, etc aren't good for anything.
What is this obsession with "emasculating," other than insecurity that women are no longer under men's thumbs? While there definitely can be, and is, *belittling* behavior, why must men always relate it back to "I'm emasculated." Why do men insist that women be "feminine" (ie submissive) and "womanly" (ie sexy), or they're emasculating men? This is my problem with the Apatow-genre films. They perpetuate the image of the emasculated male and the over-competitive emasculating woman, rather than searching for how both men and women can respect each other and either build a relationship or not according to their own preferences, not according to what others demand.
Depth of Female Characters in Funny People
By: phillcalle | Fri, 07/31/2009 - 08:46
Daisy seems very real to me: she's smart, skeptical, capable of screwing up, capable of forgiveness. It's as if she has her own movie, and hers intersected Ira's for this brief moment. And yes, I would love to see the Daisy movie.
Laura reminds me of George. She's nicer than he is, but they are both self-centered, focused on their own hurt and boredom. Ira's critique of George's behavior, that his happiness would come at the expense of destroying Laura's family, applies to Laura too. Really, what kind of people would have an affair right in front of the kids? (None of this excuses her husband's behavior, of course). Laura too is interesting enough to carry a movie.
I find these two characters a lot more interesting than Katherine Heigl's character in Knocked Up for the simple reason that they have lives of their own. They are not subordinate to the protagonists. Their lives go on with or without these guys. Unlike the women in Apatow's first two movies, the women in Funny People do not exist simply to teach the male protagonist important life lessons.
had a woman made similar movies about her feelings towards men
By: p.bateman | Fri, 07/31/2009 - 06:52
"Had a woman made similar movies about her own feelings toward men, I'm sure she would not be criticized nearly as much"
.
.
i completely agree with this. the fact that we have women criticizing, getting uncomfortable over trivial things in media, and collecting grievances selectively to make a case for 'media is misogynist' just goes on to re-affirm that women are more sensitive than men and are easily offended.
.
.
men have the ability to laugh at themselves.
I see a lot of emasculating
By: Usama3 | Fri, 07/31/2009 - 02:17
I see a lot of emasculating cultural content everyday. I just watched a female physican's assistant assert herself onto a male patient who was reluctant and uncomfortable about exposing his genitals to her so she can examine them (PG show: Royal Pains). This woman is so busy trying to show her patient that she has a command of the topic, but fails to address his personal needs.
"Drop your shorts"?
Is this is the American woman today: eye candy ( good to look at) but in the drive to outcompete and outperform men and prove their superiority, they loose their actual feminity and womanhood?
Every man is not an alpha male, nor are most males competing in everything they do. But I see more and more women like this, or at least trying to do so.
Love Oprah, but she is not married, has no kids nor wants them, tends to berate and belittle (emasculate) men, and is one in a billion women.
Negative Stereotypes
By: reader2 | Thu, 07/30/2009 - 12:57
The most concerning part of these movies for me is the stereotypes of both women *and* men that they are subtly injecting into our larger culture. These films are part of a larger, and disturbing, trend in pop culture toward portraying all women as shrews and all men as immature boys. While I couldn't care less about supporting characters, character development etc - after all, they are just comedies - I think these stereotypes are having seriously negative impacts on gender relationships. Men who watch these movies come away with the impression that they can be crude, irresponsible, immature slobs - and they still get the hot, successful woman. Of course, they also come away being reassured that they don't want the woman, because she's a shrew who destroys all happiness and joy. Think about it. These films give men cultural sanction to not have to grow up, and to see marriage and relationships as emasculating prisons.
Impressions
By: E. Craig | Thu, 07/30/2009 - 02:08
I think it's important to explore the possibility that Apatow, in portraying women in his movies, is not necessarily representing what he thinks of women, but instead how men often "feel". As a man, I can say Apatow's movies movies feel very "true." He captures a feeling men often have, whether or not it actually represent how they view women. The sexes (genders?) are in fact different and do in fact view gender interaction differently. Had a woman made a similar movies about her own feelings toward men, I'm sure she would not be criticized nearly as much. Apatow is not making a political statement-he's capturing a true and real experience.
Change the "an" to an "a"
By: maximillianw | Wed, 07/29/2009 - 18:39
;)