We've been harping on Meryl Streep's extraordinary lack of interest in working with A list directors who might actually, you know, direct her for a decade. She's finally working with one. She's now attached to Ricky and the Flash and, juvenile sounding title aside, it sounds like a potential winner.
She'll play a rock star trying to reconnect with her estranged children when her career peters out. The script is by clever Diablo Cody and in the director's chair, none other than Oscar winner Jonathan Demme. He's quite gifted with actresses having previously directed arguably career best work from actresses as diverse as Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married), Melanie Griffith (Something Wild), and Jodie Foster (Silence of the Lambs). He also guided Michelle Pfeiffer, once his favorite actress, in her best romantic comedy outing (Married to the Mob). More...
I'm tremendously eager to see what a real director can do with Streep at this juncture. She continually challenges herself in terms of the roles she takes but almost never with directors of note or films that display the level of craft in all departments you'd expect from a three-time Oscar winner. I don't think it's any accident that her modern renaissance kicked off with three consecutive projects by strong directors with all around excellence in filmmaking: The Hours, Adaptation and Angels in America.
But there are two things here that give me pause. First, wouldn't this project be better suited for an actress in her 50s rather than an actress in her mid60s... given the time frame by which rock careers for women tend to fade. Obviously me being me I weep for what might have been with a Pfeiffer/Demme reunion but it need not be Pfeiffer. Imagine what Holly Hunter (who'd be totally believable as an ex rock star) could do with a meaty role like that? And second, Jonathan Demme has directed Streep before in that weak remake of The Manchurian Candidate (2004). Y'all know I love Streep despite my lukewarm feelings about a few of her recent star turns but it's actually my single least favorite performance of her career.
So I should be happy. But I'm not. You?