Pfeiffer aged up to play grey haired Ruth Madoff in "Wizard of Lies"The McConaissance ended with an Oscar and an Emmy nomination. The Reeseurgence went well, too, even if it's pop cultural impact wasn't so Wild. Can't we get a Pffeiffival now? (I'll have to work on the name but renaissance and resurgence were already taken so I'm going with revival).
As previously reported our favorite M.I.A. movie goddess Michelle Pfeiffer, Susie Diamond herself, is back at work. She and Robert De Niro are currently filming their roles as The Madoffs in HBO's telefilm "Wizard of Lies". It will be Pfeiffer's first major television role in over 30 years. Among the top bakers dozen of female movie stars of the 1980s (roughly speaking that's: Streep, Close, Lange, Spacek, Midler, Keaton, Basinger, Pfeiffer, Turner, Weaver, Field, Hawn, and Winger in no particular order) only Pfeiffer and Hawn have refused to do television since. Streep and Close even dabbled before it was cool to toggle back and forth. Hawn doesn't really count as she is essentially retired and with Pfeiffer making an HBO film, yes, TV has won the final round. (There's a great conversation about this, via Jane Fonda -- who retired from movies halfway through the 1980s -- in the forthcoming movie Youth)
But the most exciting thing about Pfeiffer returning to acting is not that she is -- look we've been here before and she never dives in the pool after sticking a toe in but runs from the water -- but that she'll do so twice in short succession. After the HBO movie, she's signed on for a regular movie, a proper silver screen effort from Killer Films called Beat Up Little Seagull.
Pfeiffer at her last film promotion event way back in September 2013
This is a very big deal for a number of reasons: Killer Films is awesome and has been for decades -- you can thank them for Todd Haynes and and also the bulk of interesting LGBT movies from the past couple of decades; Pfeiffer never does "indies" so she's getting out of her comfort zone which is well past long-needed; it's a leading role and she's too luminous to get shoved to the background to play someone's supportive grandma; the director previously made the indie Mother of George which was shot by cinematographer Bradford Young... so can we hope he affixes his brilliant lenses on Pfeiffer? (What better subject for his eye than one of the world's great screen beauties?)
The film is described like so:
Beat-Up Little Seagull follows the life of a sensitive and fragile woman (Pfeiffer) who struggles to find footing in a fast-paced world. When her mother dies, she faces a crisis in which she must find a means for survival, all the while hiding her struggles from her new lover (Sutherland)."
"Sensitive and fragile" Pfeiffer? Yes please. Perhaps she'll even cry in a sweater or lie to herself. That all said we look forward to trying hard not to view this 'struggles to find footing in a fast-paced world' plot as a thinly veiled allegory for La Pfeiffer's repeated disinterest in her own career.
Comment if you embrace this news with wet eyes and/or if you're suspicious that she won't go through with it. You can have both reactions. Your host here at The Film Experience is living proof.