De Niro's 'Comedian' a movie that forgets its own punchline
Robert De Niro's dark and sassy stand-up comic dramedy "The Comedian" feels like a 119-minute setup that forgot its punchline.
"The Comedian" works as a provocative character study of a caustic, aging comic lashing out at a world he doesn't understand or care about.
But the moment four screenwriters try to give him a caring heart transplant near the ending, the movie suffers from a comic's worst nightmare: Bad. Timing.
De Niro spent considerable time hanging out with real comics to prepare for his role as iconic comedian Jackie Burke, a bitter man hounded by the nostalgic impact of his 1990s hit sitcom that his adoring fans won't let him forget.
The actor's research pays off, although he already had a jump-start on the character when he played delusional nut-job Rupert Pupkin in Martin Scorsese's "King of Comedy."
De Niro arms Jackie with enough verbal napalm to suggest Sam Kinison on quaaludes, a blunt and blue comic now spewing only a portion of the rage that came so easily to his characters in "Taxi Driver" and "Raging Bull."
It's good to see De Niro tackling a multilayered character who's funny without being cartoony, threatening without being sadistic.
His performance dominates "The Comedian," and his outstanding supporting cast of Danny DeVito, Patti LuPone, Leslie Mann, Edie Falco and Harvey Keitel pulls no punchlines with spot-on performances of their own.
"The Comedian," directed by Taylor Hackford, entices us into Jackie's world with rich characters and challenging relationships. But then, inexplicably, its screenplay figuratively and literally poops out.
Jackie and his loyal, put-upon agent Miller (Falco) go into a New York club where a heckler pushes the former TV star into becoming Jake LaMotta for a moment.
In court on battery charges, Jackie can't bring himself to issue an apology. So, he gets 30 days in the slammer followed by a kazillion hours of community service.
In a soup kitchen, Jackie meets fellow con Harmony (Mann), working off a sentence for assaulting her ex.
A slow and measured romance percolates, and Mann's playful-yet-grounded realist makes it feel genuine, despite the obvious and acknowledged age gap between the two.
Billy Crystal plays himself in an amusing cameo that casts him in an awkward light.
DeVito and LuPone play Jackie's henpecked brother and his scarily intense sister-in-law in a comical domestic subplot that threatens to bump Jackie's less engaging story out of the movie.
Finally, Cloris Leachman plays a 90-plus comic still saucy enough to dish it out at a Friar's Roast held in her honor, an event that takes a dark, indelicately handled twist that drops "The Comedian" into a bitter spiral.
At a Florida retirement community, Jackie performs a scatological version of the song "Makin' Whoopee" now called "Makin' Poopy."
From here on, the movie becomes as strained as the retirement community's supply of peas and carrots.
“The Comedian”
★ ★
Starring: Robert De Niro, Leslie Mann, Danny DeVito, Edie Falco
Directed by: Taylor Hackford
Other: A Sony Pictures Classics release. Rated R for language and sexual references. 119 minutes