Coming-out party
Washed-up actors come to gay teen’s aid in cliched ‘Prom’
Does content trump quality? Ryan Murphy’s “The Prom,” which is like the proverbial fingernails on a blackboard in almost every way, is a film adaptation of a 2018 Broadway play.
Like the play, the film tells of “fabulous” Broadway performers — grande dame Dee Dee Allen (Meryl Streep), gay leading man Barry Glickman (James Corden), amusingly named aging chorus girl Angie Dickinson (Nicole Kidman) and song and dance man Trent Oliver (Andrew Rannells of “Glee”) — whose latest extravaganza, a biographical show about Eleanor Roosevelt, is shut down by those … awful … critics. The actors try to restore their relevance by driving to Indiana, where they try to help gay girl Emma Nolan (Jo Ellen Pellman).
Emma, who dresses like Annie Hall’s less hip niece, is persona non grata at her conservative high school because she insisted on taking another girl, whose identity is a mystery (I can’t see how), to the prom and rather than allow that to happen, local bully Mrs. Greene (Kerry Washington), head of the PTA, has forced the school to cancel prom. One of the story’s many tiresome ironies is that Mrs. Greene’s daughter Alyssa (Ariana DeBose of the upcoming and notably similar musical “West Side Story”) is Emma’s secret lover. Emma’s parents have thrown the 16-year-old out, forcing her to move in with her grandmother (Mary Kay Place, a relief from all the tackiness).
On the side of the students is high school principal Mr. Tom Hawkins (Keegan-Michael Key), a single man, who is a Broadway show buff and, in the film’s biggest surprise, is not gay. The Broadway scenes show the performers dancing in front of Sardi’s and then reading the terrible reviews inside.
Are the lyrics of the songs by Chad Beguelin, Bob Martin and Matthew Sklar send ups of bad lyrics from bad Broadway musicals? Or are they just plain bad? Is Corden as annoying as he was in “Cats”? Well, at least we don’t have to see him in his fur suit. Wokesters have complained that Corden is not gay, so his performance as a gay man is “minstrelsy.” Who’s going to get the Tina Louise joke? These times are so complicated.
The filmmakers do everything to remind us that we are in the present, including a line about “trending on Twitter.” But I could not shake the feeling I was watching a dismal high school production of “Bye Bye Birdie” (or over 2 hours of “Glee”). We know from “Mamma Mia!” that Streep, who looks like a WASP Chita Rivera, can belt out a tune, and she has a funny bit about playing Eva Peron. The choreography is rudimentary when it involves Streep or Corden. The line, “Bigotry’s not a bit of me” may sound like Cole Porter. But it isn’t. The swankiest restaurant in town is the Applebee’s. There’s a Bob Fosse-like number about celebrating your “Zazz” as in “pizzazz.” Edgewater is no Gary, Indiana, to be sure.
The basic premise of a young gay person, a child really, coming out and being rejected by his or her family and community has great resonance. But “The Prom” — with its confetti guns, sequins, washed-up actors and production numbers — is like watching the Oscars.