Screenwriter Finnerty Steeves gives an insightful lead performance in this smart, sharp and touching look at New York actress Jennie Lonergan (Steeves) “before/during/after” the dissolution of her marriage.
Steeves creates an identifiable heroine in Jennie, especially as she makes the grueling rounds of auditions for small plays and TV commercials. Jennie and husband David (Jeremy Davidson), a commercial sailor, made a financial sacrifice to live in Manhattan (this is the rare New York movie that actually makes a point of explaining how people afford to live there). After 15 years, it’s a crushing blow when Jennie discovers tDavid is cheating on her. The humiliation plays out in therapists’ offices starting with Kate Burton who heads a list of solid supporting talent. The tight lipped David wants to try someone else, so the fraught couple move on to several others including an oddball (Richard Masur) who’s a bit too familiar.
Directed by Stephen Kunken and Jack Lewars, the film effectively moves through time as Jennie, cutting back and forth between happier times, the devastating end of Jennie’s much-longed for pregnancy and her recurring dreams of a baby girl and Jennie’s audition for a play called “To Have and to Hold” in a role that mirrors her life. The film nails the cattle call aspect of auditions; the nods to the other aspirants who all fit into the same age group and character type. Steeves is a great deadpan, self deprecating wit as Jennie’s life falls apart yet she gamely pushes on, clinging to a memory of the woman she aims to be.
Her script is sharp enough to make everyone three dimensional, from Jennie’s loving parents (John Pankow and Kristine Sutherland) to David to the guy with whom Jennie takes flirting baby steps to Jennie’s girlfriends who encourage her, support her and get drunk with her. There are likable cameos from Austin Pendleton and Kathleen Chalfant as a dentist and assistant who ask personal questions while Jennie is in the chair. Michael Emerson plays Nigel, the stage director who senses Jennie’s connection to the role that ends up being cathartic and the first step to figuring out who she is and what she really wants.