Four months after suffering a terrible accident after plunging 30 feet into the orchestra pit during a performance of the star-crossed Broadway musical, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Christopher Tierney returned to the show.
Tierney, a former Houston Ballet Academy student, met with the New York media outside of the theater where the accident occurred Dec. 20 and declared himself "85-90" percent recovered from the accident, according to an account in The New York Times.
Tierney had fractured his skull and shoulder blade, breaking four ribs and fracturing three vertebrae when his safety harness didn't hold while performing gravity-defying stunts in Spider-Man mask and costume.
“I can’t wait — I’m ready to put on the harness right now and fly around,” he told reporters.
On Monday Tierney rejoined the show, which is on a brief hiatus after director Julie Taymor was ousted following terrible reviews even though it was still in previews and hadn't yet officially opened on Broadway. Previews of the revamped show begin May 12 with a planned opening on June 14.
Asked if he were nuts to rejoin the show, he replied, “Yes, slightly." But he earlier said that he "wouldn't be here right now if there was a problem."
His return should come as no surprise to those who know him. In a CultureMap interview soon after the accident, Houston Ballet soloist Kelly Myernick, who was a classmate with Tierney at the Houston Ballet Academy in 1998-99, said that "Chris is definitely one of the most fearless performers you'll ever come across. He was always daring in dance, trying things that no one else would even attempt. This production was perfect for him. It just fit his personality."
The impact that writer/director/producer James L. Brooks has made on Hollywood cannot be understated. The 85-year-old created The Mary Tyler Moore Show, personally won three Oscars for Terms of Endearment, and was one of the driving forces behind The Simpsons, among many other credits. Now, 15 years after his last movie, he’s back in the directing chair with Ella McCay.
The similarly-named Emma Mackey plays Ella, a 34-year-old lieutenant governor of an unnamed state in 2008 who’s on the verge of becoming governor when Governor Bill (Albert Brooks) gets picked to be a member of the president’s Cabinet. What should be a happy time is sullied by her needy husband, Ryan (Jack Lowden), her agoraphobic brother, Casey (Spike Fearn), and her perpetually-cheating father, Eddie (Woody Harrelson).
Despite the trio of men competing to bring her down, Ella remains an unapologetic optimist, an attitude bolstered by her aunt Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis), her assistant Estelle (Julie Kavner), and her police escort, Trooper Nash (Kumail Nanjiani). The film follows her over a few days as she navigates the perils of governing, the distractions her family brings, and the expectations being thrust upon her by many different people.
Brooks, who wrote and directed the film, is all over the place with his storytelling. What at first seems to be a straightforward story about Ella and her various issues soon starts meandering into areas that, while related to Ella, don’t make the film better. Prime among them are her brother and father, who are given a relatively small amount of screentime in comparison to the importance they have in her life. This is compounded by a confounding subplot in which Casey tries to win back his girlfriend, Susan (Ayo Edebiri).
Then there’s the whole political side of the story, which never finds its focus and is stuck in the past. Though it’s never stated explicitly, Ella and Governor Bill appear to be Democrats, especially given a signature program Ella pushes to help mothers in need. But if Brooks was trying to provide an antidote to the current real world politics, he doesn’t succeed, as Ella’s full goals are never clear. He also inexplicably shows her boring her fellow lawmakers to tears, a strange trait to give the person for whom the audience is supposed to be rooting.
What saves the movie from being an all-out train wreck is the performances of Mackey and Curtis. Mackey, best known for the Netflix show Sex Education, has an assured confidence to her that keeps the character interesting and likable even when the story goes downhill. Curtis, who has tended to go over-the-top with her roles in recent years, tones it down, offering a warm place of comfort for Ella to turn to when she needs it. The two complement each other very well and are the best parts of the movie by far.
Brooks puts much more effort into his female actors, including Kavner, who, even though she serves as an unnecessary narrator, gets most of the best laugh lines in the film. Harrelson is capable of playing a great cad, but his character here isn’t fleshed out enough. Fearn is super annoying in his role, and Lowden isn’t much better, although that could be mostly due to what his character is called to do. Were it not for the always-great Brooks and Nanjiani, the movie might be devoid of good male performances.
Brooks has made many great TV shows and movies in his 60+ year career, but Ella McCay is a far cry from his best. The only positive that comes out of it is the boosting of Mackey, who proves herself capable of not only leading a film, but also elevating one that would otherwise be a slog to get through.
