Soapdish has a few scenes that are generally funny but all in all it falls flat. It actually starts with some good, promising satire, with ridiculously good looking people getting cast as a rabble crowd of homeless people, and scenes about the casting couch. And Kevin Kline playing Death of a Salesman in bad dinner theater in Florida. Genuinely funny stuff. But it very quickly gets lost in a very uninteresting story about failed attempts to derail Sally Fields' character's career (attempts that, despite the hyped up acting, never has any real teeth or even sense of high stakes) and her triangle relationship with her supposed niece and Kevin Kline's character. So much wasted talent here! Kathy Najimy, a brilliant comedic actress, is completely wasted in a throwaway role as a costumer. Even worse with Carrie Fischer! She gets one hilarious scene, making me want to see more of her and her character, and then she basically disappears for the rest of the movie. So disappointed. But the worst for me was the end, which relies on a horrible and very offensive transphobic joke.
The best satires are grounded in some version of reality. Part of the fun is recognizing the truth in even the most ridiculous of situations, since the truth itself is often ridiculous. The Soapdish producers seem to have felt that if you just mix in a few jokes with an otherwise uninteresting story, you'll have good satire. Instead they settled for a few cheap laughs. What a waste of a talented cast.
The best satires are grounded in some version of reality. Part of the fun is recognizing the truth in even the most ridiculous of situations, since the truth itself is often ridiculous. The Soapdish producers seem to have felt that if you just mix in a few jokes with an otherwise uninteresting story, you'll have good satire. Instead they settled for a few cheap laughs. What a waste of a talented cast.