Review of She's Funny That Way (2015) by Michael P — 27 Dec 2018

Written and directed by Peter Bogdanovich (one of my favorites), this throwback to classic screwball comedies like "Bringing Up Baby" or "It Happened One Night" tells the story of the opening of a Broadway play by director Owen Wilson and playwright Will Forte.

When Wilson crushes on an escort he calls to his hotel room one night, a charming Imogen Poots, she turns out to be an aspiring actress who later nails her audition for the aforementioned play and makes things complicated when Wilson's wife, who's one of the stars of the show (and who's being seduced by her on-stage co-star, Rhys Ifans) wants Poots to be her co-star over Wilson's objections.

Things get even more complicated when Forte begins to crush on Poots over his shrewish psychologist girlfriend, Jennifer Aniston (who's also Poots' psychologist). And all that is established pretty much the first 25 minutes of the movie! For fan of classic comedies, "She's Funny that Way" is a real treat, but for modern audiences not attuned to the mannered style of old fashioned comedies, I'm not sure how well it would be received.

Still, it's a pretty hard to resist cast, which also includes Richard Lewis and Cybill Shepherd as Poots' parents, Debi Mazar as her madam, as well as Tatum O'Neal, Colleen Camp, Jennifer Esposito, Michael Shannon, Joanna Lumley, Austin Pendleton, and Quentin Tarantino as himself.

Overall, "She's Funny That Way" is not a classic, but it's a treat for film buffs.