The Impostors

Acting, at least acting well, especially for film, can be a rather savant talent. That's why Letterman and Leno get paid so much. Not because they can act, but because they sometimes interview movie stars who are very capable on film yet don't appear to be all that gifted in other areas of life such as thinking and conversation, and often manage to make them look witty and entertaining. So it's a treat to find an actor who's not only fun to watch, but can craft a good film from behind the camera as well. Stanley Tucci's second directoral effort, in which he also stars, is out on video, and it's the kind of thing that you might as well invite everyone in the house to watch with you whether you think they'll get it or not, because your sudden outbursts of laughter will have them looking in on you anyway.

Tucci and Oliver Platt play Arthur and Maurice, two out-of-work actors in 1930s New York. Well, they're out of work in the same sense as Matthew Modine's character in The Real Blonde, in that they don't appear to have ever actually worked as actors, at least not on stage, but they sure want to awfully badly (that is, they want it badly, not, they want to badly act), and practice incessantly, both in theatre exercises conducted in their apartment, and street scenes designed to get them out of stores and restaurants without paying for the food. When a director finally hires them (Woody Allen in an unbilled cameo), the play folds before the first read-through can even finish.

Their talents ultimately get tested to the extreme when, after fleeing the police for prompting a hammy, overrated English thespian (Alfred Molina) to injure himself in a bar deflecting their insults, they stowaway on a cruise ship. There they encounter a virtual Audobon's guide to bipedal archetypes from period screwball comedies, lovingly recreated with a conspicuous dose of contemporary profanity, including: a Teutonic head steward (Campbell Scott, who also appeared and co-directed with Tucci in the 50s period screwball N.Y> comedy Big Night) prone to shouting, "EX-cellent;" a Marxist saboteur (Tony Shalhoub, also in Big Night) from some unspecified Esperanto-speaking country, masquerading as first mate; the queen (Isabella Rossellini) he hopes to either abduct or blow up; a gay wrestler (Billy Connolly); a couple murderous grifters (Flirting with Disaster's Richard Jenkins, and Allison Janney, the porno-writing guidance counselor from 10 Things I Hate About You) looking to separate lonely passengers from their money and their lives; the ship's suicidal crooner (Steve Buscemi), who's too distraught over his divorce to get through a single song; a once wealthy socialite (Dana Ivey) whose philanthropic husband left her penniless in his otherwise charitable will; the aforementioned blustery Englishman; and a can-do ship's purser (Lili Taylor) who seems to be the most nearly normal primate onboard. Their duty to save the day clear, the claustrophobic Maurice sums up the situation succinctly: "Arthur - it's time to act!"

Tucci employs a simple, straightforward style that relies heavily on uncomplicated camera set-ups and the players' slapstick abilities. Each character gets an ample share of laughs, although Tucci reserves the best line for himself; his attempt to name a birthplace while masquerading as a Brit had the Pepsi coming out my nostrils. And, as in Big Night, there are a few long, uninterrupted scenes where the players have to make good with no editing cuts to clean up any mistakes.

Based on an idea Platt and Tucci (sounds like a manufacturer of big radial engines for WWII aircraft - "The D-19 has a cruise range of 3600 miles at 28,000 feet at 280 miles per hour, thanks to the power of its Platt and Tucci R-3870 double-row engines…") had while studying theatre at Yale, The Impostors comes across like a Bob Hope/Bing Crosby Road movie, or a full-length Three Stooges romp. Crammed with simple, universal humor, it's the kind of film that could please anybody if it weren't for the language, which was severe enough to earn it an R rating. So it will have to stand as more of a vehicle for the filmmaker's unbridled comic talent than an attempt to get on The Family Channel. B

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