September 7
Director: Nathan Silver
Screenwriters: Nathan Silver, C. Mason Wells
Cast: Jason Schwartzman, Carol Kane, Robert Smigel, Caroline Aaron, Dolly De Leon, Madeline Weinstein, Matthew Shear
After the movie: Madeline Weinstein, who plays Gabby in the film, will talk with Neil Labute about her experience on the movie and take questions from the audience.
Ben (Jason Schwartzman) is a forty-something cantor losing his voice and possibly his faith. Struggling to meet the expectations of his rabbi, congregation, and not one but two Jewish mothers (Caroline Aaron and Dolly De Leon), Ben finds his world turned upside down when his grade school music teacher re-enters his life as an adult bat mitzvah student. This warm and anxious comedy from prolific writer/director Nathan Silver explores the complexities of belief, connection, and what it means to be a real mensch.
Madeline Weinstein made her film debut opposite Harris Dickinson in Eliza Hittman's Beach Rats, which premiered at Sundance in 2017. She has performed on Broadway in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and The Real Thing, as well as off-Broadway and regionally in the world premieres of Itamar Moses’s The Ally (The Public Theater) and Tracy Letts' Mary Page Marlowe (Steppenwolf), as well as Simon Stone’s Medea (BAM). Other credits include the Netflix feature film Alex Strangelove and HBO's Mare of Easttown.
Neil N. LaBute is an American playwright, film director, and screenwriter. He is perhaps best known for a play that he wrote and later adapted for film, In the Company of Men, which won awards from the Sundance Film Festival, the Independent Spirit Awards, and the New York Film Critics Circle. His films include: The Shape of Things, The Wicker Man, Nurse Betty, Some Girls, Possession (starring Gwyneth Paltrow) Lakeview Terrace, House of Darkness, Out of the Blue and Fear The Night starring Maggie Q and more. His plays include Fat Pig; Some Girls, Reasons to Be Pretty, The Mercy Seat, This is How it Goes, The Shape of Things and more.
"Both stars -- romantic leads with character actor cred -- have the power to be funny and heartbreaking simultaneously, and their unique chemistry drives the film’s craziness and humanity" - Thelma Adams, AARP.