Ok, We Need To Talk About 'Dear Evan Hansen'
#146: "Dear Evan Hansen," "Squid Game," "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street," "Yellow Belt Fury"
Edition 146:
Hey movie lovers!
As always, you can find a podcast version of this newsletter on Apple or Spotify. Thank you so much for listening and spreading the word!
In this week’s newsletter: It’s an extended conversation about the musical-turned-movie Dear Evan Hansen, with this newsletter’s official Broadway correspondent Will Kennedy. Then, it would be straight up malpractice to not discuss “Squid Game,” the most popular show in Netflix’s history, and I give a shoutout to a promising short. In this week’s “Trailer Watch,” Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest masterwork is set to release, featuring a scene for which I was present for the filming.
Dear Evan Hansen
As soon as I walked out of my showing of Dear Evan Hansen, I immediately wanted to talk to Will Kennedy. In addition to being this newsletter’s official Broadway correspondent, Will was also the man I saw the stage production of this show with back in Chicago in early 2019. Needless to say, we both had MANY thoughts, on everything from Ben Platt’s de-aging techniques to the tonal shifts that changed a similar plot into an entirely different story.
Our conversation ran almost an hour, in which I got out all my thoughts and rants on the movie. So rather than repeat myself, I’m printing an excerpt of the conversation here in place of a review. For more, check out the 25-minute edited version of our conversation in this week’s edition of the podcast, which is available at the link above (or on iTunes/Spotify by searching “No Content For Old Men”).
The first half of the podcast conversation is spoiler-free, and the second half is full spoilers. This written excerpt is 100% spoiler free, as always!
Enjoy!
Matt: Let’s start with just top line, if somebody hasn’t seen the show and wants to see this movie, would you recommend it to them?
Will: That’s a hard question…I would say yes, but I would also say if you ever see the stage show know that it’s better and it’s different. One of the biggest issues with most movie musicals, that this one nails is that all the cast were serviceable singers, whereas Les Miserables 2012 that wasn’t the case. But there was a lot of shifting of the plot, the direction and how it was handled in transitioning it to the screen, and a lot was really lost in that translation…
…One place where the movie couldn’t really pull that off is the character of Evan is so dead-set on believing the fact that he’s a young, naive kid. And when Ben Platt looks like he’s 45 years old you just can’t suspend that disbelief.
Matt: This has become the dominant talking point of this movie.
Will: It’s not as bad as people think it is. I got past it pretty fast.
Matt: There are moment throughout it where it’s pretty obvious. I think Ben Platt is at a different point of life now that makes him less suited to this role. Now that he’s established, more rich and famous, he just carries himself like somebody who is that. When he would smile in the movie it looked like a rich, famous person smile. That broke the fourth wall. And the other thing, I actually don’t know if he’s that good of a screen actor. Stage acting is totally different.
Will: Totally, you have to exaggerate movements and everything.
Matt: There was times in the movie when he was really big and it didn’t really work, especially when contrasted with Kaitlyn Dever.
Will: She was the star of it for me.
Matt: She’s great, and when they’re in scenes together she’s a great screen actor and acting for the camera much better, and I don’t know if he’s that good of an actor…
…But on the flip side, he nails the songs. Because his voice is known for the songs.
Will: He was with the project from well before it got to Broadway, like three years before it got to Broadway. So when these songs were tweaked they were tweaked specifically for Ben Platt. When he sings them he does them justice, and you can’t tell that much apart from when he sang them on the cast album to when he sang them on the motion picture album. They’re really good and he’s a great singer.
Matt: Here’s my thing though. So the casting is good for the most part, the songs were well done, there’s a lot of good elements here. And that’s why it’s almost surprising why it didn’t work.
Will: It’s just super frustrating. But I’m a big of a Broadway snob. Every time a Broadway movie comes out, there’s only one instance where I didn’t hate it.
Matt: My main point is just that they changed the tone. The emphasis in the movie is very earnest and sweet and saccharine. We texted about this before the movie came out and I think what happened was, the show comes out and the music comes out, more people listen to the music than see the show, and then one song from the show — “You Will Be Found” — takes such a huge cultural resonance that when most people think of Dear Evan Hansen they think of this song. And the song out of context…
Will: It’s beautiful.
Matt: It’s inspirational, empowering, it’s awesome. It made me think of the musical The Greatest Showman. You remember that one, with Hugh Jackman?
Will: Yep, it was written by the same people!
Matt: That makes some sense. I remember when that movie came out, there was a song in that movie — “This is Me” — that was the same thing. It was an inspirational anthem, the type of song where the whole cast would come on “Good Morning America” to sing it, and oh man aren’t we great. And that movie leaned all the way into that tone. The problem with Dear Evan Hansen is that the show didn’t fit that song, at all…
…They kind of retrofit the rest of the movie around the tone of that song.
Will: The show…I told you it’s sort of the Uncut Gems of Broadway. Because you know how it’s going to end and it’s not going to end well the whole time, but you’re sitting there watching this train about to crash.
Matt: The movie…gives you a sense of happiness. I think it’s literally let’s empower people and make people feel good during this movie, which is a fundamental change…
…When everything was super messy, you were left to be introspective as you said. And now that everything is out there and solved, it’s taking my own involvement out of it.
Will: You don’t have to think about it.
Matt: Which is why the lasting impact of the show makes you want to go see it two nights later. Whereas I don’t have any interest in rewatching this movie.
Will: Still, if you don’t have any ability to see the show or anything, yes absolutely see the movie. The story is similar, similar message, it’s just frustrating as a big Broadway guy.
Well there you go! A somewhat hesitant endorsement from Will and I. We will probably have him back on around the release of the new West Side Story. Let me know what you all think of this format and maybe we’ll mix it in more regularly.
Something New
Squid Game (Netflix): Ted Sarandos, the CEO of Netflix, said this week that he expects this Korean drama to become the most watched (or at least the most sampled) show in the streamer’s history. It came out of nowhere, no hype, and spread like wildfire by word of mouth thanks to an incredibly juicy and well executed premise: desperate people drowning in debt compete in a Hunger Games-style tournament based on children’s games like “red light green light.” Except that elimination means…death, and survival means big payouts. It’s curious, but not entirely surprising, to see another Korean story so keenly observing class disparity, and the show effectively blends the personal stories of the players with the raw thrill of a competition reality show.
Something Old
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007, Paramount+): I’m breaking my pre-2000 rule again here, only because I feel like I’ve recommended the 1961 version of West Side Story at least two or three times now. By now you know you’re supposed to see that one before Steven Spielberg’s remake comes out later this year. Instead, I’ll give a nod to Will Kennedy’s favorite Broadway adaptation, which is directed by the eccentric Tim Burton (Beetlejuice, Planet of the Apes, the Michael Keaton Batman movies) and stars Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter and Alan Rickman. It’s creepy and stylish and somehow manages to pull off the adaptation from stage to screen successfully.
Something to Stream
Yellow Belt Fury (YouTube): Shorts have long been used as a proving ground for aspiring filmmakers, a less expensive way for someone to show off what they can do. In the case of Katherine Hughes, who wrote and directed this five-minute story about a woman who learns karate to save the world from aliens, it’s the announcement of an exciting new talent. I won’t deny the giant screen crush I’ve had on Hughes as an actor since Me and Earl and The Dying Girl, but she’s got undeniable style and confidence behind the lens as well. Here she shows elements of Wes Anderson and Edgar Wright (two of my favs, it should be noted), with a fun, kick-ass vibe that forecasts exciting things to come, should she want to pursue the filmmaking route.
Trailer Watch: Licorice Pizza
Paul Thomas Anderson is one of the signature filmmakers of the 21st century. Each of his new releases is hailed as a major event among cinephiles, who have been feverishly blogging about the details of this trailer as it stealthily played in independent theaters around Los Angeles over the past few weeks before it was released to the web. People are calling it “Boogie Days,” a callback to Anderson’s previous masterpiece, and you shouldn’t need me to convince you to watch it.
Plus, I won’t let you all forget that I accidentally stumbled upon the filming of a scene of this movie, when Bradley Cooper goes crazy at a 76 gas station (in the trailer, it’s the clip where he smashes in the car windows with the squeegee wipers). Back then it was called “Soggy Bottom,” a title that has mercifully been updated before its release.