Review: Ed TV
How is it different from The Truman Show? That's what everyone keeps asking. Well, consider this: how is The Truman Show different from the ongoing documentary series that began with 7 Up or MTV's The Real World? Real people in relatively unmanufactured situations? The difference is in the details and Ed TV tickles as much as it tantalizes.
Like Truman Banks, Ed Pekurny (Matthew McConaughey) is the star of his own television show. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, the banalities of the San Franciscan's life are broadcast to people around the country. Unlike Truman, Ed agreed and is very aware that he's live on the air. He and his eponymous show are the brainchild of a programming director named Cynthia (cannily played by Ellen DeGeneres, whose own outing was and still is the subject of national scrutiny), who deems Ed the perfect candidate.
Ed is 31, a video store clerk and a good old Southern boy who loves his mama (Sally Kirkland), his stepfather Al (Martin Landau) and his big brother Ray (Woody Harrelson), who looks upon little brother's moment to shine as an opportunity to promote his new gym. At first, viewers are inexplicably entranced by the sight of Ed waxing poetic about the art of clipping toenails, sitting in the bathroom and showing off a hamper he designed (it's lined with a mirror so he can still view the TV from where he sits) and professing his admiration for Burt Reynolds. Then things start to get interesting.
Eagle-eyed viewers note the attraction brewing between Ed and Ray's girlfriend Shari (Jenna Elfman), a UPS worker with a history of failed relationships. When Ray's indiscretion hits the airwaves, it opens the door for Ed and Shari to act on their feelings. But it's not happily ever after just yet. Though Ed is comfortable with the camera crew following him about, Shari is not and her reluctance to the spotlight becomes anathema to the viewers who begin passing judgment on her. USA Today conducts an ongoing poll about their union and when Jill, an aspiring model/actress (the delectable Elizabeth Hurley) shows up on the scene, her mix of sex and sophistication has audiences clamoring for Ed to dump Shari and take on Jill.
Ed TV carries less existensial and philosophical angst than The Truman Show but it's out to show something else. Ed is living his life, Truman was living the life mapped out for him. The loss of privacy becomes more of a point in Ed TV -- his voluntary status as a pseudo-celebrity almost sentences him to a prison-like existence. The script by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel brims with wit and surplus charm and director Ron Howard, himself a TV baby, wisely maintains the vibe of goodnaturedness that runs throughout the film.
McConaughey is darling. It took a while to find the perfect follow-up role to his careermaking turn in A Time to Kill. Though he's worked with Robert Zemeckis (Contact) and Steven Spielberg (Amistad) in prestige pictures, they haven't shown him to good effect. As Ed, he's fast, loose and funny with a cockiness that endears instead of repels. There's an openness about him that suggests you could share a drink and a barrel of laughs but when the golden boy is hurt, the disappointment is so palpable as to be discomforting. McConaughey becomes still, his eyes darken, his lips tighten, and you clutch your stomach. So, as Ed, McConaughey not only displays his comedic and dramatic talents but his viability as a romantic leading man as well. There's a scene where he shields the kiss he shares with Elfman's Shari with his jacket -- his effortless gesture of chivalry elicited quite a sigh.
The real revelation, though, is Elfman who expresses such poignancy as the insecure wallflower who's stung by national criticism. Audiences find her too needy, too bony, not hot at all. RuPaul even deems her a skanky ho. People may laugh but it's really quite horrifying to watch how oblivious people can be to a person's feelings. Celebrity may seem a glamorous profession but would you be as willing to accept the jibes and judgments of people you've never met? I, for one, would pass. But not on Ed TV.
Ed TV
Directed by: Ron Howard
Written by: Lowell Ganz, Babaloo Mandel
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Woody Harrelson, Jenna Elfman, Sally Kirkland, Martin Landau, Rob Reiner, Ellen DeGeneres, Elizabeth Hurley, Dennis Hopper, Adam Goldberg
