When a movie goes off the rails I try to do what Roger Ebert says, and imagine the elevator pitch that got it approved. The pitch for The Stand In might have been “Trading Places meets Death To Smoochy,” or maybe “All About Eve meets Dave.” Come to think of it, either of those look like amazing ideas compared to this strange film about two look-alikes who change places.
Although billed as “hilarious,” right down to its poster on my on-demand service, The Stand In is actually a whole lot darker than that, offering an interesting rumination on the price of fame. The film follows Candy Black (Drew Barrymore), a comedy star since the early ’90s, pouting a silly catchphrase and gross-out material, which her agent Louis (TJ Miller) proudly calls “an alternative form of quality.” This stardom of hers comes to an end somewhat abruptly in the film, when she has an on-set meltdown, injures her actress friend Jenna Jones (Ellie Kemper), and drops out of the public spotlight. Her excess gives way to her downfall, but even moreso for Paula (also Drew Barrymore), her stand-in who dreams of stardom when she’s not standing around marking the spots for her leading lady to sit in.
Having fallen on hard times, Paula is particularly enthusiastic when contacted about what she thinks will be an “acting role,” but is really just an odd proposal from Candy: she requires Paula to stand in for her at rehab, figuring no one will notice the difference, as the two practically look like twins. This ruse blows out of proportion when Paula-as-Candy begins to make all sorts of public and personal appearances, launching an “apology tour” where she appears on a bunch of talk shows, with various hosts such as Jimmy Fallon, Ryan Seacrest, Kelly Ripa, and James Corden all playing themselves. Paula increasingly moves to fill the void between her and Candy, expanding the charade by inserting herself into the one thing that has kept Candy sane during and after her breakdown – a texting-only relationship with a man she met on Tinder named Steve (Michael Zegen), the first step in a series of events that fall somewhere between protecting what she has and getting her revenge.
Babbit’s direction, written by veteran screenwriter Sam Bain, provides many clunky moments, many of which simply aren’t funny despite trying hard to be, but there are some fairly amusing asides about how Hollywood works, which offers a jumbled critique of sorts. The jokes are not enough to overcome the mediocre storyline, peppered with swear words and drug references to make it seem edgy, and they fail to disguise the absence of wit and imagination that came along. It’s like if Drew Barrymore’s appearances in all those Adam Sandler movies had inspired her to create her own version of one of them, with some of Sandler’s Funny People meta-commentary added in. If the film was still a Hollywood critique with more focused and with a more serious tone, it would have worked very well. Instead, it unfortunately meanders through as a comedy that never really manages to be very funny.
The performances are a mixed bag as well. Barrymore is fun to watch, but both Candy and Paula are almost the exact same – they talk the same, they look the same when Candy cleans up, and there is nothing that makes one stand out over the other. On top of that, we don’t really have a reason to root for either of her characters other than that “one of them wants to be famous and the other doesn’t.” The script gives brilliantly talented actors, like Andrew Rannells (as a social media consultant), Holland Taylor (as a director who is the closest thing this film has to a villain), Zegen, and the always-sweet Kemper, nothing to work with. The cameos from real-life hosts are simply nothing more than “oh, look who that is,” which doesn’t help the film in any way. As movies go, The Stand In certainly isn’t a headliner. Yet like its title character, the movie and its star get about as much mileage as they can out of this opportunity.
2.5/5 STARS