A Stand Up Guy

Note: This review is from 2016

Movie review by Jay Richardson

Given the historical relationship between American comedy and its Mafia-run nightclubs – including evidence to suggest that the label 'stand-up' may even have been appropriated from the Mob – it's perhaps surprising that more films haven't sought to exploit this shady connection.

A Stand Up Guy – just released on demand – has the intriguing premise of a low-level Brooklyn criminal entering the witness protection programme as he prepares to Testify against his boss. Relocated to a sleepy, one-bar town 'somewhere in Wisconsin' and somewhat taken with the barmaid, Sammy can't resist taking the opportunity to perform comedy at the open mic night. But when a clip of him punching some hecklers goes viral, his former associates are alerted to his whereabouts and set out to silence him.

It's a neat idea and capably set-up. Looking like a young Al Pacino, Danny A. Abeckaser is well cast as the cocky hoodlum who never fulfilled his potential, scraping together child support for his ex to raise their young daughter.

Called a 'wise-ass' and 'loudmouth' with some justification by his cohorts and cops alike, he's re-named Derek Hesh when he cuts his deal and is entrusted to the supervision of a scarcely interested US marshall, played with impassive disdain by My Name Is Earl's Ethan Suplee.

The problem that completely undermines the film, and indeed all films about comedians, is that you need a decent comic to play a decent comic. Or at least to write his lines. Otherwise there's an awkward disparity between the audience's reaction within the film and those watching it at home or in the cinema.

Writer-director's Mike Young's own stand-up includes a spot on The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson, and you'd hope he brings snappier routines to his own performances.

Ignoring the fact that the punch salvo with which Sammy/Derek floors his hecklers is never viral-level remarkable, and certainly not career-boosting like the blow that Jim Jefferies infamously received at the Manchester Comedy Store, he's confident and slick. But his material is wholly nondescript, regardless of whether it's just the setups that are shared, and less funny than his needling of his friends in Brooklyn.

What's truly odd though is that the film itself can't decide the level of its protagonist's talent. Charming everyone in Wisconsin, from the infatuated barmaid, Vicky (Annie Heise), to her intimidating, biker gang leader brother Manny (Jay R. Ferguson), Derek's meteoric rise in popularity soon leads to him supporting an eccentric Jewish rock star and a spot on a late night television show, even as Sammy himself realises his routines are hack.

Over the course of the film, he graduates from tall tales about his delinquent youth, to compering, to aggressive insult comedy, through blonde jokes, to confessional, to storytelling with broad national stereotypes, then back to confessional with a saccharine message.

Ironically, the bone-dry Manny, who is funny, has been telling him to be more honest from his earliest spot.

Luke Robertson and Jay Seals are an appealing double-act as Sammy's bickering former partners-in-crime turned would-be assassins, clowns with genuine menace. But veteran comic Bob Saget is badly underused as a stalker-songwriter.

Perhaps the oddest character though, belongs to the familiar Hollywood face of Michael Rappaport as the local chief of police. Overburdened with strange, 'comedic' tics but blessed with seemingly god-like intuition, he's only ever seen in his office, presumably due to the actor's time schedule constraints. Unfortunately, this quirk only reinforces the perception that he belongs in another film.

The sub-plot about Sammy maintaining his relationship with his daughter feels unnecessary as the threat of his murder is jeopardy enough. But she's part of the sentimental impact this career criminal has on the folksy Wisconsins, who to a wide-eyed inhabitant are empowered by his acquaintance, as the open mic night starts drawing them all in.

There's never any real doubt that Sammy is a nice guy who went off the rails slightly, which is a pity, because a less sympathetic character might have made for a more interesting story.

Equally, an established comedian who absolutely had to perform, whatever the danger, rather than a bored newcomer who got lucky would have been more appealing.

So this feels like a good idea disappointingly executed. One rather suspects that Dito Montiel's recently announced and narratively similar The Clapper, starring The US Office's Ed Helms, based on the director's darker, more satirically-inclined novel about a nobody propelled to fame on The Tonight Show, will almost certainly eclipse A Stand Up Guy.

• A Stand Up Guy is available on Amazon Video, from £3.49 to rent.