Not Coming to a Theater Near You

God Said, ‘Ha!’ / USA / 1998

While Eddie Murphy and Will Ferrell are earning millions in their post-SNL careers, Julia Sweeney has been talking. Touring the country with her monologues—first with God Said, ‘Ha!’, and more recently with Letting Go of God—she has found a strong and devoted following by combining pain and humor, grief and optimism, anger and happiness, all centered around the ways life can suddenly change.

God Said, ‘Ha!’, which revolves around her brother Michael’s fight with cancer, is more a story of her family. The talk, beginning with Sweeney’s move into a new apartment, which she adapts to fit an idealistic vision of a single woman’s busy life, slowly becomes a story of love and compassion when she must adapt her new lifestyle to fit her parents and siblings, who move in to support Mike. Suddenly, she tells us, she is stuck back in childhood.

I remember listening to a version of Julia Sweeney’s monologue on NPR’s “This American Life,” which was much longer and performed in front of a live audience. Which is where Sweeney seems to feel at home—in front of an engaged gathering of fans. In God Said, ‘Ha!’, the film version of that same monologue produced by Quentin Tarantino, Sweeney’s talk is condensed and delivered to an empty theatre (though a distant laugh track, perhaps recorded from an actual live performance, is heard). She seems torn between looking out among the empty chairs and looking deep into the camera, trying to find listeners somewhere behind the curved lens. Had this been shot during an actual performance, with cameras panning out occasionally over the audience, and Sweeney feeding off their energy—the NPR recording has her laughing with them—it would be much better. Still, as a testament to someone who’s felt tragedy touch her life, this is a surprising and uplifting film.

by Adam Balz | Source: Miramax VHS
16 Jun 2007 12:22 PM | Submit Comment