The Birdcage

1996's THE BIRDCAGE can be cited as one of the few Americanizations of beloved world cinema to achieve artistic success, perhaps even *gasp*, best its progenitor.  1978's French/Italian comedy LA CAGE AUX FOLLES was a big hit even on these shores........and ripe for the screwing up.  A pure farce with a classic premise.   But the new film had director Mike Nichols and his old comedy team partner Elaine May as screenwriter.  A dream team.  Truly can't miss.  They say that a lot in Hollywood, but things often do.  Not this time.  This is one of the most inspired remakes I've seen.

Setting it in colorful South Beach was the first good idea.  Casting Robin Williams and Nathan Lane as the main characters, a gay couple who own the titular nightclub, had to be at least the second.  And having Williams play the low key Armand instead of the flamboyant, prone to theatrics Albert was another wise move.   This is one of my favorite of Robin's performances, proving he can ramp it down when motivated.  And still be just as funny.  He almost plays, ahem, the straight man to Lane's drama queen and Hank Azaria's over the top Agador Spartacus, their live in housekeeper who thinks soup is a dinner entree.  I challenge you not to crack up while watching him. 

Gene Hackman also gets to shine as Senator Keeley, co-founder of the Coalition for Moral Order, whose daughter Barbara (Calista Flockhart) wants to marry Armand's son Val (Dan Futterman).  Dianne Wiest is appropriately awkward as Keeley's wife and Christine Baranski is playful as Val's mother, Katharine.  Some explaining is needed here, invisible audience.  Val is the result of Armand and Katharine drunken one nighter after a drag show twenty years ago, and he has never met her.  But he is about to after Armand suggests she play mom and attend the "meet the in laws" dinner, where of course Albert can't possibly be, given how conservative Barbara's parents are.  

Complicating matters is the death of the Coalition's co-founder, found in the bed of an underage black prostitute.  The tabloid press will be hot on the tail of the Keelys as they attend the South Beach dinner, one which has all the makings of a colossal train wreck, and is pitch perfectly orchestrated from start to finish.  The entire movie, actually.  Nichols, rebounding after a few less than classic films in the '90s, beautifully guides his actors through a perfect comedic confection.  My favorite moments involve Armand's attempts to teach Albert how to act like a man, by society's definition.  These scenes were funny in the original movie; they're solid gold here.