Ask Mick LaSalle:
“Do studios not know how to market female comedians?”
Dear Mick LaSalle: I convinced my wife to watch “Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates” based on your recommendation, despite reservations based on its marketing. We both enjoyed it tremendously. It is so relentlessly, unexpectedly funny. Aubrey Plaza and Anna Kendrick have most of the best scenes but were downplayed in advertising. Do studios not know how to market female comedians?
Derek Sagehorn, Oakland Dear Derek Sagehorn: Good point. I just rewatched the trailer, and the emphasis is on the guys, probably because male moviegoers tend to like that kind of comedy, and most men — for reasons I will never understand — prefer to watch movies about men. But the women make that movie special. The story establishes the guys as wild men who need staid dates for their sister’s wedding. And then it introduces the two women, who are even wilder than the men and who trick the men into thinking they’re sweet and proper. This is like a comedy device out of the Restoration — it’s classic and surefire. Plaza and Kendrick are hysterically funny in it, and so is Sugar Lyn Beard, who is central to the funniest scene in the movie. My wife went in skeptical, too, but loved it. By the way, I noticed the trailer has scenes that weren’t in the film, so I just got the Blu-Ray to see what was deleted. Dear Mick LaSalle: Some actors from Hollywood’s golden age come down to us as icons and some, though highly revered at the time, are forgotten. Paul Muni falls into the latter category. Why has Muni faded, and what special quality has allowed Bette Davis and others to endure?
Dave Sironen, San Francisco Dear Dave Sironen: Paul Muni was a good actor, and he’s not exactly forgotten. He’s been dead for 50 years, and we can still have a conversation about him, so he’s doing all right compared with most dead people. But he’s not remembered in the way we remember Cary Grant or Bette Davis because he was a chameleon-type actor. He didn’t have an indelible personality that was with him from film to film. And personality in the arts is what’s remembered, especially in movies. Another thing is that Muni is what people at the time thought of as a great actor, and such notions change and become dated. For example, look at the three famous gangster movies of the early 1930s. We have “Little Caesar” with Edward G. Robinson, “The Public Enemy” with James Cagney, and “Scarface” with Paul Muni. Robinson and Cagney’s personalities, in their respective films, leap across a gulf of almost 90 years. They are vital and totally idiosyncratic — no one was like either of them before or since. And then you have Muni giving an actorly performance in “Scarface,” trying to suggest an animalistic quality in the way he walks and carries himself. Of course, at the time, people looked at the three and thought, wow, that Muni is an amazing actor. But now the performance looks a bit obvious.
Which leads us to today. I wonder — and I really mean I wonder; I’m not guessing or predicting — if people we think of today as the greatest actors will seem obvious to another generation. I think Meryl Streep’s performances are safe for the long haul, because as much as she is supposedly a chameleon, the pleasure of watching her is not the pleasure of believing that we’re seeing, say, Julia Child, or an Italian immigrant, or a woman whose baby is eaten by a dingo. It’s the pleasure of watching Meryl Streep pretend to be those women. We never forget we’re watching Streep. She’s not disappearing. She’s not fooling us. On the contrary, she is as much the spectacle as the character she’s playing. I’d say the same for Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. But what about Daniel Day-Lewis? Maybe he’s 22nd century’s answer to Paul Muni. Or maybe not. We look to history for patterns, but we’re in the flow of history and really have no idea what’s going on.
Have a question? Ask Mick LaSalle at mlasalle@sfchronicle.com. Include your name and city for publication, and a phone number for verification. Letters may be edited for clarity and length.