by Curtis Edmonds -- blueduck@hsbr.org
EDtv is the story of a man named Ed (Matthew McConaughey) whose life is the subject of a television show that runs all day, every day, across the nation, up close and personal. And if that sounds familiar, keep reading.
Ron Howard's EDtv was unfortunate enough to follow the similarly-themed The Truman Show into theaters, and as a result, it may never find as wide of an audience or as generous a critical reception. What a pity. EDtv is everything that The Truman Show isn't: funny, smart, entertaining, sophisticated, and wry. The Jim Carrey effort is as monolithic, grandiose, and pretensious as the giant dome of its soundstage, and as bland as its population of Stepford extras. EDtv is as quirky and funny as the streets of San Francisco where it's set, and is populated by a small, diverse universe of off-beat characters who would be quickly shooed out of Seahaven.
It helps that the protagonist of EDtv isn't making any great acting stretches. Where Jim Carrey was straining to talk out of his mouth instead of his butt in Truman, all McConaughey has to do is play a good ol' boy from Texas transported to San Francisco. Ed is, perhaps, the only thirtysomething video store clerk in California who's not working on an independent movie -- the only thing he's working on is the beer he has on a leash around his neck. He's picked almost by accident to be the star of the new show on the "True TV" network, and accepts the idea of having the cameras watch every detail of his life because it pays pretty good, and hey, how else is he ever going to be on TV?
Whether by design or accident, Ed turns out to be an ideal personality for live TV. He's got a good up-and-down relationship going with his brother's ex-girlfriend (Jenna Elfman) and a riotous family led by his dimwit brother (Woody Harrelson) and his elderly stepfather (Martin Landau, who gets laughs every time he opens his mouth.) The funniest scenes in the movie are the ones that highlight these relationships, primarily because the EDtv show allows them to keep tabs on Ed through their Trinitrons. EDtv does a wonderful job of setting up these relationships and using the TV show as a vehicle to transform them.
And McConaughey's easygoing charm and appealing smile don't hurt one bit. Ed seems like a guy you'd want to hang out at the pool hall with, and McConaughey never makes him annoying, never mugs for the camera, never uses his newfound celebrity to push people around. You couldn't ask anyone to do a better job in this role than McConaughey does.
To have a good TV show, though, you have to have more than just a good star. For one thing, it helps to have an audience. The audience was one of the annoying conceits of The Truman Show was the audience. Every once in a while, the story would cut away to someone watching -- nay, staring -- into their television set, watching the antics of Truman Burbank with rapt attention. The Truman Show audience was wise to every nuance of the show, schooled in the protagonist's history, and seemingly is unable to move from their couches. This may not be all that different from your typical television audience. To be honest, it's not all that different from what I do on a Sunday afternoon watching the Cowboys play the Giants. But the constant image of millions silently staring at flickering screens, enraptured by the life of a tremendously boring insurance salesman, did nothing but accent the annoying smugness of The Truman Show.
The audience is a part of EDtv, too, but it's a different audience, and a better one. The pretensious Truman Show would have us believe that it's the number-one show, worldwide, has been for years, will be forever. EDtv executives know better: all they need to be successful is to have people watch for five or so minutes, two or three times a week.
It's a smaller audience, and a busier audience. We see people watching EDtv while going about their daily chores, exercising, chopping bell peppers, what have you. Only the teenagers and college kids are watching closely (which tells you all you need to know about the types of shows that are on TV nowadays). It's a smarter audience, too. The EDtv show runs sixteen hours a day, with the network wisely deciding that no one really needs to see Ed sleeping. But most importantly, the EDtv audience, unlike The Truman Show audience, is actually being entertained.
Both EDtv and The Truman Show make the same assumptions about our culture, or significant lack thereof. As our technology explodes, making more and more bandwidth available, the quality of programming has imploded. What we're left with is an even vaster wasteland than we've ever had before, populated by "irritainment" and least-common-denominator programming. EDtv and Truman are the reductio ad absurdum of this line of thinking, but at least EDtv realizes that even the most absurd of shows has to entertain on some level. The scene where Ed trims his toenails is more entertaining than anything we see in The Truman Show. More than that, EDtv is a more realistic look at television, and as such, has more success as a satire. Compare the harried, frenetic workplace of the TrueTV headquarters to the serene, Godlike lair of Ed Harris and tell me what's the truer picture of entertainment today.
I can't say for sure, but I think EDtv works better as a movie because its creators have more television experience. (If anyone in this country has grown up on TV, it has to be Ron Howard.) Howard wisely decides to forego the highbrow approach and make a well-written middlebrow comedy -- higher quality than you get on Must See TV, but in the same spirit. Most of the supporting actors are best known for their TV roles: Ellen DeGeneres as the harried True TV producer, Rob Reiner as her boss, Woody Harrelson as the steroid-crazed brother, Jenna Elfman as the pouting girlfriend. (Not to mention Howard's Happy Days buddy Donny Most as a colorless network yes-man, and brother Clint Howard as the harried man-behind-the-curtain directing the show.) TV types don't get a lot of respect in Hollywood for some reason -- witness Oscar shutouts for Howard's Apollo 13 and Reiner's A Few Good Men -- but the hilarious, well-crafted EDtv demands a level of respect at least equal to that of you-know-what..
In fact, forget I ever said anything about The Truman Show. Remember Splash? Tom Hanks and John Candy and Darryl Hannah as the mermaid? It's like that: a good, funny, warmhearted Ron Howard comedy, as welcome as bluebonnets in the Texas springtime. Go see EDtv and forget you ever heard of a movie called...
Wait a second... forget... I forgot something... dangit, what was it...
Oh, yes! Fellow members of the Elizabeth Hurley Admiration and Appreciation Society, front and center. Our Liz has just but a short role, but it's well worth the price of admission... especially if you can catch the Entrapment trailer with Catherine Zeta-Jones. Enjoy.
-- Curtis Edmonds
blueduck@hsbr.org
"No children have ever meddled with the Republican Party and lived to tell about it." -- Sideshow Bob
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