Review: "The Good Nurse"

By Christopher James

Talented actors can only take a project so far. Netflix’s latest feature, The Good Nurse, lives up to its title, but not by much. Based on a true story of a nurse who poisoned a large number of patients across ten hospitals, the source material is perfect for a true crime obsessive. However, what usually makes those stories interesting are the odd details that lodge into a viewer’s brain, making the story unable to shake off. The Good Nurse is an aggressive play straight down the middle, as it opts to be more of a character piece. Oscar winners Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne do plenty of heavy lifting in the lead roles, but can’t turn an okay movie into a great one.

Our titular “Good Nurse,” Amy Loughren (Jessica Chastain) is what we call a trope magnet...

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The Good Oscar Winner

by Nathaniel R

With Jessica Chastain in NYC, October 18th, 2022. Photo by Colby Wong

Look how I ran into last night at The Good Nurse premiere at the Paris Theater in NYC! And by "ran into" I mean "eagerly accepted an invitation to attend assuming we'd get to say hello again"...

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Jessie Buckley and Eddie Redmayne win Olivier Awards

by Nathaniel R

Jessie Buckley & Eddie Redmayne at the Olivier Awards yesterday

On Sunday across the pond the West End's Olivier Awards were held at the Royal Albert Hall. Since Broadway and the West End are on different schedules despite cross pollination you can sometimes get clues as to what future shows might be big at the Tony Awards and which Broadway shows have transferred well to London. Regarding the latter, London got two high profile Broadway transfers this season, the 2011 Sutton Foster led revival of Cole Porter's Anything Goes and the 2019 musical adapation of Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge! both of which won multiple Tony Awards in their seasons. In stark contrast, they took only one prize each at the Oliviers. Disney's Frozen also lept across the pond but, just as it had in NYC, it received a few courtesy nominations but no wins.

The big Olivier winners were a new play based on the book/movie Life of Pi using actor operated puppets for the animals and yet another revival of Kander & Ebb's eternally thrilling Cabaret...

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Showbiz History: Jupiter Ascending, Coraline, and silent sex symbol Ramon Novarro

6 random things that happened on this day, February 6th, in showbiz history

1942 The comic western Valley of the Sun hits theaters. Hollywood was struggling to figure out what to do with Lucille Ball that decade. This was one of those 'well, how about this genre?' attempts...

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"Trial of the Chicago 7" and Best Supporting Actor

by Nathaniel R

Abdul-Mateen, Shenkman, Rylance, Redmayne and Sharp in "Trial of the Chicago 7"

You've waited long enough. This is our latest ever take on the acting categories in 20 years of punditry. But you know, "2020". Consider it an all purpose hellscape excuse! Though Hollywood is still in disarray there will eventually be another Oscar ceremony. Nominations are still more than five months away (March 15th, 2021) so if this were any other year these prediction charts would essentially be the early August charts. Does that make sense? In other words, much about this Oscar season has yet to be revealed. 

But let's take a stab at Best Supporting Actor since we've just screened The Trial of the Chicago 7 which is basically the kind of movie that dreams of, no fantasizes lustfully, about filling in all five spots. The most Supporting Actor nominations to have arrived from a single film is three, which happened twice in Oscar history via The Godfather (1972) and The Godfather Part Two (1974). It will probably not happen again with Chicago 7, but it theoretically could given that it's ALL supporting actors all the time.  Let's rank them shall we, in terms of Oscar possibility...

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