Review: Don't Think Twice
Saturday, July 23, 2016 at 12:30PM Manuel here with a review of Don’t Think Twice, which is out in Limited release this weekend.
Mike Birbiglia’s Don’t Think Twice is a movie about failure. Or rather, about what happens (and the choices we make) when success is not just elusive but altogether unattainable. It’s a film that papers over those platitudes about believing in yourself and following your dreams no matter what (terrible advice by itself) and presents us a story about what happens to those who can’t or won’t succeed at what they’re talented at.
The film, focused on an Improv group (“The Commune”) boasts a stellar ensemble led by Birbiglia himself. As the oldest member of the troupe, Miles—who was “inches away” from nabbing a coveted spot on the cast of the SNL-ish Weekend Live years ago and who’s seen friends actually get on the show, much to his chagrin—epitomizes the arrested development of the entire group...
Along with some of his fellow Commune players, Miles lives in a Brooklyn loft space that makes the name of their Improv group self-explanatory (an old flame from high school is perhaps less kind and disdainfully calls his living situation little more than a dorm). Along with Sam (Gillian Jacobs), Jack (Keegan-Michael Key), Bill (Chris Gethard), Allison (Kate Micucci), and Lindsay (Tami Sagher), Miles is putting in the hours teaching and practicing improv hoping that he can get the big break he knows he deserves.
That’s precisely what happens to couple Sam and Jack who impress the producers from Weekend Live during one of their performances and are asked to audition for the show. And, to add further insult to injury, this happens right as the Improv for America theater where The Commune perform is set to be sold, leaving them with no venue. It’s perhaps an all too perfect setup for the personal soul searching that follows—the plot splinters into ‘let’s put on a final show’ and ‘this is your shot to stardom’ but refuses the tidy generic constraints of either.
Were Don’t Think Twice another film, we’d have followed Jack’s self-confidence and razor-sharp careerism with awe. After all, he seems to be the one character who knows what he wants and who’s willing to sacrifice what need be to get it. Instead, Birbiglia and Key give us an obnoxious showboater who achieves his dream but not without alienating those around him—his is not quite a road to success journey nor a redemptive narrative about finding the error of one’s ways. Instead, the screenplay mines his once in a lifetime shot as a way to put into relief the way those in The Commune have to cope when one of their own succeeds—necessarily, though not exclusively, at their expense.
And then, because the film is truly an ensemble, Don’t Think Twice gives us variations on that theme, with Sam, Allison, Lindsay, and Bill navigating the prospect of never coming into their own. Here is where, as much as everyone in the film is fantastic (actors and improv players themselves, it’s no surprise they make their characters as manic and exhausting, as entertaining and annoying as you’d imagine performers to be in real life), I’d like to single out Jacobs’ work as Sam. As Jack’s foil—where he’s fueled by his conviction she all but shatters under its weight—Jacobs makes Sam’s self-effacement and modesty feel endearing. By far one of the most talented of her group (you should see Jacobs-as-Sam do Hepburn on the Dick Cavett show, it’s sublime), Sam is crippled by that nagging feeling of being, perhaps, not as good as she thinks she should be. Isn’t rejection easier to cope with when it is you who refuses to give anyone else the chance to say No? Don’t you sidestep the idea of failure when you refuse to play the game altogether? In a final tour de force improv performance (the Community actress is so good in that third act climax) Sam puts it in much simpler terms: sometimes it’s fine staying down in the well you’re in.
In Jacobs’ voice (and with Birbiglia’s deft tone at the helm), Sam’s statement reads not like an abdication or complacency but like a bold epiphany about her own path. Success may be the name of the game, but it need not be the end of it, too.
Reader Comments (3)
I saw this at the Boston International Film Festival a few months ago and completely fell in love. Can't recommend this one highly enough!
Ooh, I saw the trailer for this before The Lobster with some friends, and we all agreed it looked great. Very relatable for anyone of any age, but I think especially if you're in your 30s...when for most people you've had to let go of at least a dream or two, or are faced with the reality that you might have to. And then what do you do?
Saw this on Saturday and was thrilled. Jacobs gets to the core of how the spectre of failure can be a happy struggle.