Seth Rogen shines as a hapless studio head in this adorable, witty Hollywood comedy. A hilarious, visually stunning love letter to movie-making.
Ever wondered about the business of making movies? Along with the director and his team, there’s the whole engine of the production house that participates in the creation of what lands in the movie theatres for our pleasure. If you are in the corporate world, think of it as a project with a tight deadline and a large team split into departments with specific responsibilities. Seth Rogen’s The Studio gives us a peek behind the curtain at the joy and agony of making movies with a high and potent dose of humour.
Rogen plays Matt Remick, the new head of one such production house called Continental Studios in The Studio. Matt worked as a studio executive for years; a position that falls lowest on the list of people with creative clout. He’s less a name and more a cheap suit who has no business being on a film set, at least from the artists’ perspectives, as is vividly illustrated in the first scene.
Immediately after being promoted, he drowns in the immense responsibility of making decisions to balance his personal agenda with the company’s financial goals, represented by the CEO of the parent company, played by Bryan Cranston (menacing yet funny). Matt says he wants to make prestige films like Robert Evans (he made Rosemary’s Baby, Love Story and The Godfather as a studio head) did. But his wardrobe and cars, which get progressively more expensive, show that he spends more time looking as cool and stylish as Robert Evans than on the job.
The first episode succeeds in exemplifying Matt’s conundrum as his boss gives him his first task, to make a movie on the Kool-Aid man, and make millions for the studio in the process. The memorandum is clear– to make a Super Mario Bros.-type movie. But Matt wants to make something like an auteur-driven Barbie. He charts a shortsighted course to get Martin Scorcese to direct his Kool-Aid movie. Working with some of the greatest actors of all time, Martin Scorsese has learned a thing or two about acting and is fantastic playing a version of himself.
The former studio head, Patty Leigh (a sharp and hilarious Catherine O’Hara) is his mentor and teacher but she too is busy hustling and kissing ass to the creatives like every producer in town. Matt’s closest friend, Sal (Ike Barinholtz), now hates him as he has to report to Matt, representing the side of high-paid executives around the world that’s battling alcohol or cocaine or some kind of addiction.
It only makes sense that a show about movies looks cinematic and in that regard, The Studio is exceptional. Being in the business for 25 years, Rogen and his partner Evan Goldberg have learned the skill of expressing art through the camera because the artistry at display can compete with the best shows on TV. Shows like The Larry Sanders Show or Curb Your Enthusiasm never had such lofty ambitions of elevating comedy whilst also looking drop-dead gorgeous. We get long, complex takes, sometimes lasting an entire episode, with structure as intricate as a Jacques Tati or a Buster Keaton film, underscoring the chaos that is Matt’s career.
Musically, the show has the mood of the Golden Age of Hollywood, like the episode called ‘The Missing Reel’ which is a combination of parody and pastiche of noir movies. Each episode is loaded with ironic twists and incredible laugh-out-loud moments, with a star-studded list of cameos.
At the centre of it all though, is Matt, who despite his best intentions, isn’t equipped to deal with his high-pressure job. Some could say, including his team, that he is too soft to be the head of a studio. Despite being the ‘money guy’, he acts like a school kid who is fighting for a seat at the cool table at the canteen with the rich and beautiful. Rogen has given himself an acting challenge here, which undoubtedly, once and for all, establishes him as a comic actor with range.
The brand of comedy that Seth Rogen and his partner Evan Goldberg have produced, created a character that represented men of a generation. That character is a full-grown man now, with a real job, but is just as unprepared as he was in his youth. The Studio is adorable, witty and made by people who love movies for people who love them.
Matt Remick – ‘Trust me, if it were up to me, we would be making the next Rosemarie’s Baby or Annie Hall or, you know, some great film that wasn’t directed by a fucking pervert.’
Quinn Hackett – ‘Turns out, perverts make great movies.’
Matt Remick – ‘They really do.’