THREE TO TANGO
Reviewed by Harvey Karten Warner Bros./Village Roadshow Director: Damon Santostefano Writer: Rodney Vaccaro, Aline Brosh McKenna, story by Vaccaro Cast: Matthew Perry, Neve Campbell, Dylan McDermott, Oliver Platt
"Three to Tango" is a romantic comedy that wants to shock the audience into laughing by presenting some cutesy takes on the gay culture. The only difficulty with this theme is that what would be startling in the 1950's is thoroughly passe by now. Since Damon Santostefano, who directed the slight story, does not have a script that can make much use of the big screen, "Three to Tango" might fit in just fine as a TV sitcom, preferably about 7 o'clock on a slow Monday evening. The story is perfectly suited to the talent of its TV-based star, Matthew Perry ("Friends"). Even its motif is strained and implausible: a multimillionaire tycoon, Charles Newman (Dylan McDermott), hires an architect, Oscar Novak (Matthew Perry), to spy on his mistress, Amy (Neve Campbell). Oscar and his partner Peter Steinberg (Oliver Platt) are fighting to win a 90 million dollar contract to construct a cultural center in Chicago. By catering to the honcho's undignified whim, Oscar believes he can beat the larger, slicker firm of Decker (John C. McGinley) and Strauss (Bob Balaban).
Any moderately intelligent fourteen-year-old will be way ahead of the thoroughly predictable plot, whose loose ends are tied up tightly, with justice perfectly meted out to each principal. "Three to Tango" is a one-joke comedy based on a gimmick so slim that Santostefano can barely sustain the romantic tension for half of its mercifully brief length. The gimmick is that Oscar, who has agreed to keep tabs daily on Amy, is erroneously thought by Oscar's boss Charles to be gay. When Amy, an artist who holds frequent exhibitions of her work, meets Oscar for the first time, it's love at first sight for both, but given that Amy believes Oscar to be gay and that Oscar must continue to play the game if he is to win the contract, the two are unable to consummate their relationship. As with virtually all romantic comedies, the two principals must be kept apart until the very end, a concept easily fulfilled by this notion.
Santostefano, making his major motion-picture debut, plays the sit-com card to the limit, using several themes to milk what little comedy can be found in the story. One such strain allows Amy to be more honest with Oscar than she would be with a guy whom she believes to be straight. She allows him to watch her while taking her bubble bath and makes him the guest of honor with her circle of girl friends as they exchange barbs about the clumsy pick-up lines they've encountered form men. In a climactic situation, Oscar is chosen as Professional Gay Man of the Year by one of Chicago's prominent gay and lesbian organizations and must give a speech to a large congregation about the joys of coming out of the closet. One of the classier jokes sees Oscar and Amy indulging in a grotesque-looking tuna melt, stepping outside the diner, and vomiting into the gutter.
One wonders what scripter Rodney Patrick Vaccaro had in mind when he believed that the entire population of Chicago would be abuzz on the morning that one of its leading dailies headlined the news that Oscar--who with his partner is expected to build the culture center--is a gay man.
The one redeeming feature of this unimaginatively photographed movie is the attractiveness of the three actors, though Dylan McDermott does appear too old for Neve Campbell whose perpetual smiles are a mite too broad to believe. If Matthew Perry has any depth beyond what he has shown in "Friends," none of it appears here. You've seen it all many times before with slightly different motifs, and as they say, "Three to Tango" is a crowd.
Rated PG-13. Running Time: 95 minutes. (C) 1999 Harvey Karten
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