{"id":341438,"date":"2025-12-10T17:43:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T17:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/341438\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T17:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T17:43:08","slug":"emma-mackey-in-stale-james-l-brooks-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/341438\/","title":{"rendered":"Emma Mackey in Stale James L. Brooks Comedy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tLet\u2019s not beat around the bush. I possibly speak for most critics in acknowledging that it gives me zero pleasure to dismiss a late-career work from a beloved entertainment industry titan who has given us so much. James L. Brooks<\/a> co-created epochal television with The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Taxi and The Simpsons; he wrote and directed movies that explored complicated relationships with infinite wit and heart, notably Terms of Endearment, As Good as It Gets and the truly wonderful Broadcast News; and he has lent his imprimatur as producer to a string of favorites, from Big and The War of the Roses through The Edge of Seventeen<\/a> and Are You There God? It\u2019s Me, Margaret<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tThat\u2019s quite a legacy, and at 85, Brooks deserves to look back with immense satisfaction on six decades of enduring work. In the interest of keeping that legacy untarnished, it\u2019s to be hoped that the unfunny, painfully charm-deficient Ella McCay<\/a> will be forgotten as swiftly as the writer-director\u2019s last feature, the misbegotten 2010 Reese Witherspoon rom-com How Do You Know<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tElla McCay\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tThe Bottom Line<\/p>\n

\tStale sitcom fodder.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRelease date: Friday, Dec. 12
Cast: Emma Mackey, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jack Lowden, Kumail Nanjiani, Ayo Edebiri, Albert Brooks, Woody Harrelson, Spike Fearn, Rebecca Hall, Julie Kavner, Becky Ann Baker, Joey Brooks
Director-screenwriter: James L. Brooks
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRated PG-13,
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1 hour 54 minutes\n\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\tEmma Mackey<\/a> stars as the title character, a law school grad who\u2019s 34 and working at the State House in a small city (unnamed, but filmed in Providence, Rhode Island), when the story starts in 2008, in the middle of the recession. \u201cA better time when we all still liked each other,\u201d says Ella\u2019s longtime assistant Estelle (Julie Kavner), who serves as narrator. A lot of people might not remember the years of the George W. Bush presidency so fondly \u2014 unless we\u2019re talking comparatively \u2014 but it\u2019s an early indicator of the rose-tinted gloss Brooks puts on even the most challenging situations.<\/p>\n

\n\tPress materials state that Ella McCay was made as a tribute to 1950s screwball comedies, \u201cpunctuated by moments of drama in pursuit of truth telling.\u201d Sure, Jan. When the results are this feeble, it\u2019s probably best to keep quiet about auteurist intent. The movie is antiquated sitcom, very much in an \u201880s vein, its veneer of schmaltz garnished with a tinkling score by Hans Zimmer that should come with a sugar-content warning.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe idiosyncratic characters that feel so unmistakably real in Brooks\u2019 best work, right down to their quirkiest eccentricities, are pretty much nowhere to be found in this script. Nor do the relationships make much sense with such a mismatched ensemble.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe story skips over Ella\u2019s rise from political wonk to lieutenant governor in the office of Albert Brooks\u2019 avuncular Governor Bill. We also don\u2019t get a lot of detail on what prompted Ella to marry high-school sweetheart Ryan (Jack Lowden) when it\u2019s tough to imagine him ever having been anything but a selfish douche. A single encounter with his pushy mother (Becky Ann Baker) should have been enough of a red flag. That one colossal misjudgment undermines our belief in Ella\u2019s principled intelligence.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe writer-director is primarily concerned with tracing the traumatic experiences that have made her both vulnerable and guarded. The first occurs at 16, when she refuses to overlook the transgressions of her father Eddie (Woody Harrelson<\/a>), who is forced to leave a senior hospital administration job after three women staffers come forward with sexual misconduct allegations.<\/p>\n

\n\tElla\u2019s mother Claire (Rebecca Hall<\/a>) still loves her philandering husband and is more inclined to forgive him. When she follows him to California for a fresh start, she encourages Ella to stay on with her stalwart Aunt Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis<\/a>), at least until she finishes high school and goes off to college. The second major trauma is Claire\u2019s death from cancer a year later, which at least gives Hall a dignified quick exit.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen Governor Bill is offered a cabinet post in D.C., he appoints Ella as interim governor. She hopes to use that position to further some kind of \u201cMoms\u2019 Bill,\u201d providing early-childhood aid, and move local politics away from the donor-soliciting phone banks and out into the communities to do some real governing. That\u2019s because Ella is caring and good, though it\u2019s hard to recall a flimsier depiction of political idealism.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe career elevation comes at an awkward time, just as Eddie returns to town after 13 years\u2019 absence, ordered by his unseen new love to put things right with his kids before they take their relationship to the next level. That means overcoming Ella\u2019s hostility and bridging the divide with her uncommunicative kid brother Casey (Spike Fearn), an MIT graduate who has become an agoraphobic shut-in since his breakup with beloved girlfriend Susan (Ayo Edebiri<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\n\tThe bigger hurdle comes when Ella\u2019s indiscretions with Ryan in a government building come to light. Disgruntled with his role as First Husband and its limited perks, Ryan makes matters worse, rather than supporting her.<\/p>\n

\n\tSalt-of-the-earth Aunt Helen \u2014 who runs a diner, just to make her even folksier \u2014 makes it her business to intervene in both the family frictions and political strife. But as irritating as Curtis\u2019 feisty shtick gets, it\u2019s nothing compared to Harrelson playing the twinkly-eyed and not exactly penitent rascal.<\/p>\n

\n\tKumail Nanjiani and Joey Brooks labor to milk the mildest of laughs from their material as the state troopers on Ella\u2019s security detail; Lowden does what\u2019s required of him in a thankless role; and Fearn earns some sympathy as the sibling most damaged by their father\u2019s lousy parenting skills \u2014 though that doesn\u2019t give his rapprochement scene with Susan any extra credibility. Even with an actor as warm and grounded as Edebiri, the relationship feels bogus. (With Opus<\/a>, After the Hunt<\/a> and Ella McCay back to back this year, the gifted Edebiri should be especially grateful for The Bear<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

\n\tAnyone nostalgic for the director\u2019s more memorable work might get a kick out of seeing him reunite with past collaborators Kavner and Albert Brooks. But almost everyone here is trying way too hard, with the exception of Mackey, who\u2019s appealing and natural even when stuck in a phony world full of phony characters.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn one of the screenplay\u2019s leaden observations that pass for human insight, Casey whines, \u201cMaybe we\u2019re all just hamsters on the same wheel, beginning to wonder if the kid who bought us has lost interest.\u201d With its corny catharses and thudding metaphors (Aunt Helen\u2019s diner is on Hope St.), Ella McCay might make you want to jump off that wheel, especially as it edges close to the two-hour mark.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Let\u2019s not beat around the bush. I possibly speak for most critics in acknowledging that it gives me…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341439,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[66029,43857,43858,88,43859,20055,206,171351,127805],"class_list":{"0":"post-341438","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-ayo-edebiri","9":"tag-ella-mccay","10":"tag-emma-mackey","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-james-l-brooks","13":"tag-jamie-lee-curtis","14":"tag-movies","15":"tag-rebecca-hall","16":"tag-woody-harrelson"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341438","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341438"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341438\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}