Emmy Analysis: Lead Actor in a Comedy Series

By Abe Friedtanzer

Lukita Maxwell and Jason Segel in "Shrinking," now streaming on Apple TV+.

Isn’t this supposed to be a comedy category? Yes, two of the shows with a questionable genre distinction -- Barry and The Bear – are represented here, but all five men chose relatively serious fare as their episode submissions. Before we dig in, let’s start with a mention of the three eligible nominees from last year who didn’t make the cut this time around. Donald Glover, a past winner of this category, had his last shot for Atlanta, and Steve Martin missed out on a repeat bid for season two of Only Murders in the Building. Most lamentably, Nicholas Hoult was somehow not selected for The Great. How that’s possible is beyond me, but fortunately the five men who did make the cut are all worthwhile…

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Link Runner 2017

Gurus of Gold pundits make some quick assessments as the new awards season begins
Paste Magazine why isn't Billy Eichner a sex symbol yet?
THR the new version of It is already causing real clowns to lose work
Advocate offers up 17 LGBT tropes that need to be retired from entertainment. This list is so wide-ranging they'll be no queer characters left on TV if they follow it!
/Film cool stuff: scratch off poster to track your viewing of 100 classic movies

The Daily collects obituaries and tributes to the acclaimed horror director Tobe Hooper (Texas Chainsaw Massacre)
IndieWire Dunkirk arranges a special screening at Toronto to celebrate IMAX. Consider that Oscar campaign already ignited
Awards Daily new stills for Call Me By Your Name. These are more likely it. The first few were so underwhelming
Towleroad Heathers is getting a TV adaptation. Leslye Headland directs the pilot which has updates for the Heathers for themselves (one of them is genderqueer) 

Off Cinema
• The Cut good deep dive into Kathy Griffin's life post that T***p photo that got her into so much trouble
• Vox winners and losers of MTV Video Music Awards
• ET literal winners of the MTV Video Music Awards (though, like the Gramys, it's not an awards show that's actually about awards)
• AV Club Jason Segel is having a tall person small door problem. Cute
• Playbill the 29 biggest grossing Broadway shows of all time from the Cabaret revival with Natasha Richardson and Alan Cumming ($119 million) to Disney's The Lion King $1.3 billion). Hamilton is already at #18 ($242 million) and it's only been open two years! (It should be noted that these are just their Broadway grosses, not touring companies and the like. 

Exit Video
Seems like there's going to be a few short films about the Blade Runner world before Blade Runner 2049 opens. Here's the first one...

Yes, No, Maybe So: "The Five-Year Engagement"

Amir here with a new edition of Yes, No, Maybe So. Today’s film is The Five-Year Engagement from the Apatow production machine, starring Emily Blunt and Jason Segel, who also co-wrote the film. 

Yes...

• JACKI WEAVER EVERYONE! The Oscar-nominated Aussie surely deserves more demanding roles but at least she didn’t totally fade away as we feared, given her age and outsider status. The movie also has Mimi Kennedy who never fails to make me laugh out loud. After Midnight in Paris, this looks more than a bit like typecasting to me, but if she can find a way to be as funny as in In the Loop we’re in for big laughs.

•Jason Segel’s been having a good few years after he forgot Sarah Marshall. He’s actually proved to be a better comedy writer than an actor. His most recent feature is, of course, in theatres now (The Muppets) and it’s been extremely well-received. Can we assume his hot streak will continue?

No, Maybe So... and the trailer after the jump.

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TIFF: "Jeff...," "Hysteria", "Take Shelter" and "Amy George."

[Editor's Note: Apologies from Nathaniel, I've been under the weather and Paolo, who has been so dependable at sending capsules and reviews our way, now has a log jam of them. So many movies to discuss. Enjoy. TIFF wraps this weekend. -Nathaniel R]

Paolo here, discovering that HYSTERIA, a film about inventing the vibrator, isn't based on the recent Broadway play "In the Next Room, or The Vibrator Play" although they tackle the same subject. However, some scenes here still look like you might see them in a stage play, set in offices of upper middle class Londoners. These are  perfectly designed offices, with the requisite deep trendy colours of today's period films. The character played by the unrecognizable Rupert Everett is an electricity geek. A generator occupies his office, a Rube Goldberg like thing connected to a feather duster. However, protagonist Mortimer Granville (a composite of three actual doctors played by Hugh Dancy) sees something else in this feather duster.

The comedy in the film is repetitive; how many 'strong hands' jokes can one take even if Jonathan Pryce, playing Mortimer's boss Dalrymple, delivers them so capably? Dalrymple's daughter Charlotte (Maggie Gyllenhaal) enters the plot, a welcome break from the 'paroxysms' of Mortimer's clients. Her story line gets dramatic when her East End connections land her in prison but there isn't enough of a struggle to convince us that something bad might truly happen to her. Gyllenhall plays Charlotte with an optimism rarely seen in her darker films. She's also required to speak in a West End English accent alongside real English actors but she's not enough to elevate this film into a genuine crowd pleaser.

HICK, based on Andrea Portes' novel, is a movie set in the middle of nowhere and ends up there, despite the wishes of a thirteen year old girl named Luli (Chloe Moretz). Luli is very knowledgeable of her  provenance, her mother Tammy (Juliette Lewis) giving birth to her in a bar. Her father's no different, the kind of guy who drives into playground monkey bars without hiding the bottle of whiskey in his hand. She decides to run away to Las Vegas even if she's too young to be part of the workforce. The film from this point forward becomes a road movie,  taking place inside cars or at pit stops.

Chloe's child acress 'rite of passage', Take Shelter Oscar buzz, and endless potato boiling after the jump.

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Yes, No, Maybe So: "Green With Envy"

Most of the time the lack of trailers at critic screenings is a wondrous blessing. I used to love watching trailers before movies but now that they show 7 to 8 of them before a feature and do so after commercials it feels like every movie is 3 hours long now. Still I really wish I'd seen the trailer to Green With Envy in front of Pirates of the Caribbean (review) this weekend...

I am crazy in love with the bait & switch here. Get to looking right now if you haven't yet seen it.

Regarding Green With Envy... just for fun as it doesn't actually exist... are you a Yes, No or a Maybe So?

• I'd love to say Yes given the warm (felt) fuzzies coming off this trailer but it looks so generic. Yes, I  know that's part of the joke. But still... the world needs no more generic romcoms.The genre needs another Annie Hall level game changer, right?

Regarding The Muppets... Yes, No or Maybe So?

• I feel nothing but eternal affirmatives whenever Miss Piggy is near. I purchased a ticket for this in perpetuity when I was 5.