Alex Karpovsky | Through the Shattered Lens

Who is the real Angelyne?

That’s question that is at the heart of Peacock’s new miniseries, Angelyne. The obvious answer is that Angelyne (played, quite well, by Emmy Rossum) is a Los Angeles icon who, in the 80s and 90s, was known for having her image plastered on billboards across the city. The billboards usually featured a provocative picture of Angelyne, her name, and a phone number that one could call. Billboards, of course, are used for advertising and Angelyne was advertising herself. What service did Angelyne provide? She provided the service of being a celebrity that people might actually run into while walking or driving around the city. She drove her pink Corvette across Los Angeles, waved at tourists, and sold merchandise to her fans. She even twice ran for governor. Before the Kardashians and the explosion of social media, Angelyne was famous for being famous. And when people asked who Angelyne was before she became Angelyne, she replied that she had always been Angelyne. Sometimes, she said she was someone who had come to Los Angeles from another state. Sometimes, she said that she was a literal angel, sent down to spread peace and help people believe in themselves. Other times, she suggested that she was an extra-terrestrial. Perhaps her most honest response was that she was whatever the person looking at her wanted to be. People saw Angelyne and they projected their own feelings onto her.

Filmed in a manner that combines faux documentary footage with flashbacks, each of Angelyne‘s five episodes focuses on someone from Angelyne’s past as they talk about their role in Angelyne’s enigmatic life. Often times, they seem to be struggling to come to terms with the fact that they’re obsessed with someone about whom they actually know very little. A smarmy reporter (Alex Karpovsky) and a twerpy filmmaker (Max Allen) both investigate Angelyne’s past and it’s hard not to resent their efforts to bring her down to Earth. (The reporter, at one point, actually says that Angelyne lost her right to privacy when she ran for governor, as if anyone seriously believed Angelyne was going to be the next governor of California. Seriously, most viewers will want to smack him.) Cory Hunt (Philip Ettinger), the lead singer of a band that Angelyne was briefly a member of, tries to take credit for creating her persona but he’s never credible and Angelyne even interupts their flashbacks to say that he’s lying. Wendy Wallace (played by Molly Ephraim) struggles to come to terms with the fact that her father, Harold (Martin Freeman), not only bankrolled Angelyne’s billboards but also neglected his family to “manage” Angelyne’s career. Angelyne’s assistant, Rick (Hamish Linklater), devotes his life to supporting and protecting Angelyne but sometimes, even he has to take a break.

All of them get their chance to tell their story and, as played by Rossum, Angelyne gets to tell her story. Not surprisingly, Angelyne’s story often differs from the stories being told about her. Frequently, a flashback will come to a halt as soon as Angelyne announces, “That’s not what happened.” When the twerpy filmmaker claims that he got Angelyne to admit the truth about who she was before she remade herself as Angelyne, Angelyne pops up to tell us that it never happened. Even after the “truth” of Angelyne’s past has been revealed, Angelyne shows up to assure that the story isn’t true and, if it is true, it’s only halfway true and it’s impossible not to respect Angelyne’s refusal to accept or admit to being anyone other than a Los Angeles icon named Angelyne. The miniseries suggests that Angelyne is someone who dealt with unimaginable pain and trauma by creating herself as almost a cartoon of what it means to be a celebrity. The miniseries also suggests that, at the very least, Los Angeles should be thankful that she did.

In many ways, Angelyne feels like a superior companion piece to Hulu’s Pam & Tommy. Both miniseries are about the curious nature of fame and the America’s bizarre celebrity culture. The main difference is that while Pam & Tommy was thuddingly literal and featured Seth Rogen wandering around with that stupid mullet, Angelyne is stylish and imaginative and there’s not a mullet in sight. Whereas Pam & Tommy struggled to justify its existence, Angelyne features a scene where the title character flies a UFO over Los Angeles. Whereas Pam & Tommy presented Hugh Hefner as being a benevolent father figure, Angelyne features a scene where Angelyne tells off a smug Hefner and informs him that there’s nothing his magazine can do for her that she can’t do for herself. For that scene alone, Angelyne deserves to be seen.

Sometimes, I wonder if I was the only filmgoer who actually enjoyed Hail, Caesar! when it was released in February.

Oh, don’t met wrong. I know that I’m being a bit overdramatic when I say that. It got some good reviews from the critics, though the praise was rather muted when compared to the reviews that traditionally greet the latest film from the Coen Brothers. I know more than a few people who have agreed with me that Hail, Caesar! was an entertaining lark of a film.

But I know a lot more people who absolutely hated Hail, Caesar! Of course, no film is going to please everyone and the Coen Brothers have always had a tendency to attempt to deliberately alienate their audience. But what has always struck me is the fact that the people who disliked Hail, Caesar seem to really, really dislike it. Talk to them and you get the feeling that they view Hail, Caesar as almost being some sort of a crime against both humanity and cinema.

Taking place in a stylized Hollywood in 1951, Hail, Caesar! tells the story of Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin). Eddie is a shadowy figure. As head of production at Capitol Pictures, Eddie’s job is to keep the “bad” behavior of the stars from getting out into the press. (The press is represented by Tilda Swinton who, in a typical Coen Brothers twist, plays twin sisters who are rival gossip columnists. If the thought of that makes you smile, you are potentially a part of the right audience for Hail Caesar. If it makes you roll your eyes, you should probably avoid the film.) Eddie is the most powerful man in Hollywood and he will do anything to protect the image of the American film industry. He will lie. He will cheat. He will threaten. He is so ruthless and so good at his job that even Lockheed Martin is trying to hire him away from Capitol. And yet, at the same time, Eddie is also a family man and a Catholic who is so devout that he goes to confession on a nearly hourly basis.

(For all you non-Catholics out there, Pope Francis only goes to confession twice a month.)

Hail, Caesar! follows Eddie as he deals with a series of potential problems. Temperamental director Laurence Laurentz (Ralph Fiennes) is upset because he’s been forced to cast Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich, giving the film’s best performance), a good-natured but inarticulate cowboy star, in his sophisticated comedy. Synchronized swimmer DeeAnna Moran (Scarlett Johansoon) is not only pregnant but unmarried as well! (It’s the 50s, remember.)

However, the biggest crisis is that Baird Whitlock (George Clooney) has vanished from the set of his latest film. A mysterious group known as The Future has taken credit for kidnapping him. It’s not really much of a spoiler to reveal that The Future is a cell of communist scriptwriters and they are determined to convert the rather dumb Baird to the struggle. As opposed to most films about Hollywood in the 50s, the communist screenwriters are portrayed as being a bunch of self-righteous and rather cowardly nags, the majority of whom spend more time debating minutiae than actually trying to the overthrow capitalism. In many ways, Hail, Caesar is the anti-Trumbo.

As you might guess from the plot description, there’s a lot going on in Hail, Caesar but none of it really adds up too much. Nor is it supposed to. We’re encouraged to laugh at these frantic characters, as opposed to sympathize with them. Eddie Mannix and Hobie Doyle both emerge as heroes because they’re the only characters who remain calm and confident, regardless of what strangeness is happening onscreen. Eddie may be ruthless, the film tells us, but at least he gets results. Hobie may not be the smartest or most talented guy in Hollywood, we are told, but at least he doesn’t pretend to be anything other than who he is.

Hail, Caesar! is a bit of a lark, a celebration of style over substance. As far as Coen Brother films go, Hail, Caesar has more in common with Burn After Reading than No Country For Old Men. The film is largely an inside joke aimed at people who know the history of Hollywood, which is perhaps why some viewers reacted so negatively. Inside jokes are fun when you’re in on the joke. When you’re not in on it, though, they’re just annoying.

As for me, I thoroughly enjoyed Hail, Caesar! It may not be the Coens at their best but it’s a lot of fun and it appealed me as both a history nerd and a lover of old movies. The best parts of Hail, Caesar! are the scenes that parody the largely forgotten, big-budget studio productions of the 1950s. This is the rare film that acknowledges that not every film made before the 1960s was a masterpiece. The Coens love movies but that doesn’t keep them from getting a little bit snarky. For example, check out this production number featuring Channing Tatum: