Soapdish

Soapdish
By Peter John Gardner

Soapdish is a comedic soap opera about a soap opera. By nature I shouldn't have liked this movie. The movie does smell of aged cheese at times, but having said that, the film works on all levels. It even has a twist ending which I dare not reveal here because it provided me with the biggest laugh I got from the film.

The film takes a loose soap opera template to tell the story of the backstage drama of a show called The Sun Also Sets (Random thought: Imagine a soap opera based on The Sun Also Rises!) and the show's resident diva Celeste played by Sally Field. Celeste's life is in turmoil since her lover left her. She wants off the show but knows that it'll be the end of her career if she does. Her only support in the production is the show's head writer Rose (Whoopi Goldberg). Montana Moorehead (Cathy Moriarity) is her younger co-star that wants Celeste off the show so that she can become the show's new darling. She cockteases the show's producer David Barnes (Downey) to try to make that happen. We also have a young actress that literally budges her way onto the show played by Elizabeth Shue that turns out to be Celeste's niece. Finally, there's Kevin Kline's Jeffrey Anderson, a former cast member and lover of Celeste's that is now performing Death of A Salesman for deaf, elderly people in Florida that David and Montana lure back to the show hoping his presence will frustrate Celeste and force her to quit.

For a movie with this many subplots and characters roaming around at once, everything flows together beautifully, and you never lose track of what's going on. The movie even throws a few saw-it-coming-but-still curveballs the way that a real soap opera would (Lori is actually Celeste's daughter? Who woulda thunk?).

If the moral of this film is to lead a life without drama, I can't get behind it. Let me elaborate. Some situations in life I consider drama. The rest is just life. Drama is the kind of negative, soap opera-y type stuff that people could avoid if they wanted to but don't. I don't necessarily like drama, and I try to do whatever I can to avoid the kind of drama that seems to follow other people around on a daily basis, but what's the fun in life if there aren't any asinine conflicts that cause a headache for a week but provide me something to laugh about later? I'm not saying people should start cheating on their significant other or try to get someone fired at their job because they don't like them, but if there's not at least a little bit of drama in our lives then the movie that they make about you after you die would either be extremely boring or be forced to take creative liberties in order to make it interesting. Would you really want a cinematic depiction of you shitting on a salad bar because nothing interesting happened in your life?