In Jake Kasdan’s dark comedy the time is the present and the setting is an executive conference room where a very important decision is being made.
The decision regards which one of three possible lead actors to use in transforming Mike’s screenplay into a new TV series. The series is about a man whose brother has died and left the family in turmoil.
But that is subject to change, although Mike doesn’t know it.
Mike knows who he wants for the lead but things are not working out. In fact, this will be the first of many things that will not work out for Mike and for his boss, Richard.
Richard, a mid-level network producer, is supportive, but the ultimate boss, Lenny, is showing an increasing need to make her opinion felt.
Lenny is an aging alpha female who has faced too many seasons of do-or-die programming. She has passed through all of the stages of executive development from excitement to seduction to expertise and has now arrived at the final stage, that being the extreme fear of failure with nowhere to go but down.
Rendered gun-shy after too many near misses her taste slides back and forth across the slippery TV programming landscape like a tank gunner in search of a target. She is slowing down like an unstable gyroscope succumbing to the forces of nature and falling off-kilter. But she won’t go down alone, she will take others with her.
Lenny is played by power woman Sigourney Weaver, three time Oscar nominee and multiple screen award winner (‘Snowcake,’ ‘Ice Storm,’ ‘Aliens,’ ‘Ghostbusters’). Her role combines the toughness of her preceding rolls with a chink of soft vulnerability---the remains of her humanity showing through even after having been case-hardened at the hands of the modern entertainment machine.
Her boss, the stereotypical head of network programming, is himself as old and toothless as the medium he commands and seems ready to cash in his chips. But something in Lenny’s feverish and psychotic desire to please him tells us that she will not be his successor. Maybe it’s the glass ceiling or maybe she simply is not good enough, but she has reached the top of her ladder and the only way out is down.
Screenwriter Mike is played by David Duchovny (Fox Mulder of ‘The X Files’ of the 1990s). Mike has been a starving artist long enough and now has his big break with a pilot that has a chance.
The brass ring is finally coming his way but Lenny’s brass knuckles are first.
David is caught up in Lenny’s web of fear and mental breakdown. Although supported creatively by Richard (Ioan Gruffudd - ‘Lt. Horatio Hornblower,’ 1998—2003 and ‘Fantastic Four’ 2005), both must answer to Lenny as they are drawn into her world by their simple need to make a living.
Richard is a recent import from the UK who, along with his wife, is disgusted with the business to which they have been drawn. But he shares one thing with Mike: a bone-tired weariness of being poor.
Is American TV their ticket to success? Or is it their ticket to the strange and self-destructive world Lenny has made for herself?
Writer/director/producer Jake Kasdan knows of what he speaks. A veteran of several successful TV series and also director of the darkly funny ‘Orange County’ he should be able to allow the TV industry to satirize itself.
But, unfortunately, that doesn’t happen here.
In ‘TV Set’ the lines seemed forced and the set-ups too obvious. Lenny’s character is crucial in driving the plot forward but instead of reaching true madness she becomes simply tedious.
Her emotional dispersion is made plain early on but as the story of her progression from toughness to outright murderous psychopathy becomes the driving force of the film, her character development is not up to the task.
Realistically enough, Mike and Richard quiver before their mutual decisions but it is Lenny who has attracted the attention of the audience.
Instead of being placed in their shoes and suffering with them, we, like Lenny, are more interested in mutual destruction.
No release date is set. MPAA rated R for strong language usage.
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