The nearest equal to Sedaris's performance would be Laura Dern's in Citizen Ruth, but Sedaris has a talent for mimicry and pantomime beyond Dern's. Sedaris's performance is something like the performance that the Tracey Ullman of A Dirty Shame (2004) might have given as Citizen Ruth, but even baser. In fact, Sedaris plays Jerri with all the incongruous comedy (but none of the tragedy) of Charlize Theron as the butch-lesbian roadside whore and soon-to-be robber-serial killer Aileen Wuornos interviewing for clerical jobs in Monster (2003).
Sedaris gives the most staggering female slapstick performance in the exaggerated, creepy-frantic Keystone vein in movie history, and with more tang than any Keystone comedienne ever had. As Jerri, Sedaris embodies an ironic view of human nature that borders on a revelation of the horror of total hopelessness but then turns that glimpse of horror back into all-out burlesque. With the series and now the movie, Sedaris has become the all-time queen of the one-dimensional, so-bleak-it's-comic visionary. (For my money, she gave the most unforgettable performance by a lead actress in 2006, edging out even Judi Dench, who in Notes on a Scandal finally gave the astonishing performance she has repeatedly been credited with.)
The movie wisely retains almost the entire supporting cast from the series, and Stephen Colbert as the teacher Chuck Noblet is a close rival as a mime to Sedaris. He does split-second 180s, emotional as well as physical, and on a broad scale, windmilling his limbs like a baseball pitcher. But he does more than invent the body language of an unfit, rebarbative teacher; he creates a character who compensates for his inability to conceal anything effectively with a lightning ability to put the other person in the wrong. And he does all this while nailing the over-explicitness of bad acting in bad scripts, yet without setting himself apart from the movie. Currently, Colbert is da man when it comes to multi-level fakery.
Paul Dinello as the art teacher Geoffrey Jellinek (who is involved in a "secret" relationship with Chuck) lacks Colbert's pantomimic boldness and precision, but has distinct assets of his own. He's the best practitioner of false modesty since Harvey Korman and has one of those cracking voices that everybody loves in '30s comedians. Dinello also effortlessly sends up a narcissism so blatant and dopey that both compassion and anger are kept at bay. (And he has a phenomenal bod, too little seen.) Geoffrey's self-love is believable for a gay man but the jokes feel more inside than the average fag joke. You are way free to laugh.
As Jerri's wicked stepmother Sarah Blank, Deborah Rush has a brittle delivery that adds a high-comic exactness to the proceedings. (Her voice also cracks on cue.) The poise with which she combines her suburban hostessliness and her dislike of Jerri is matchlessly poisonous. Rush, who was particularly memorable in Compromising Positions (1985) and Family Business (1989), maintains her high-comic, needle-prick adroitness even when she asks Jerri in front of her new, popular school friend whether she wiped her ass on the bathroom towels. Finally, Gregory Hollimon as the openly and even criminally self-serving principal Onyx Blackman reads his lines with a gusty delivery that gives the man an authority that is both formidable and hollow.
Article comments
1 - Alan Dale
you have not said it in ways i thought you never could, bravo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! your B.F.
2 - Al Barger
Hey, that's some outstanding writing, Mr Dale. I watched just one or two episodes of the series, but this definitely has me interested in seeing the feature film.
3 - Alan Dale
Lee Siegel alert: that top e-mail is, in truth, from the B.F. He's not a computer wiz and so he used my log-on without realizing that it would make it look as if I had attempted to comment on my own writing under a pseudonym. Sorry for any confusion.
4 - Alan Dale
Thank you, Mr. Barger for your comment. I'm thrilled that it has made you want to check the movie out. (Remember, though, I was quoting from the series as well as the movie.) SWC has turned me into a combination of St. Paul and Typhoid Mary--I want everyone to succumb, for their own good.
5 - Hobokamp
Now that was the most thoroughly in-depth review of SWC that I have ever seen! Bravo, well done. You really "get" what they were putting out there. What seems simple and sometimes bizarre on the surface unfolds nicely into a strangely insightful comment on society once you scratch the surface, right? Thanks for the great read-hope Amy, Paul and Stephen all get a chance to see it.
6 - Alan Dale
Thanks for the comment, Hobokamp. (Or is that spelled V-I-C-T-O-R-Y?) I totally agree that the show seems simple and bizarre on the surface, but reveals a totally coherent vision underneath. The only thing I would alter is that SWC strikes me as going deeper than social commentary. It dramatizes the lowest estimate of what we humans are, in ourselves. If you know how to send the review to the SWC, please do. Thanks again.
7 - Michael J. West
So if I found the TV show stale, clumsy, and unfunny--which I did--will the movie change my mind?
8 - Erin
What a pleasure to read this in-depth analysis of my favorite show. To those who find it stale & unfunny - you haven't watched it enough. Amy Sedaris does deserve a nomination for Best Actress.
Mr. Dale, I would love to see your review of my favorite audiobook, "Wigfield."
9 - Alan Dale
Dear Michael, I doubt the movie will change your mind. No accounting for taste! Thanks for writing.
10 - Alan Dale
Hey Erin, Thanks for the comment. It's hard for those of us on the other side of the SWC mirror to realize that some people might not like what they see. I have the disease and I don't want the cure! I doubt that further viewing will contaminate someone as resistant as Michael seems to be, however. I'll have to check Wigfield out.