‘The Musical’ Review: A Stylish Debut Undone by An Unlikable Lead
I’ve always had a soft spot for comedies about jerkish school teachers. Fist Fight and Bad Teacher, which I liked as a teen, made Giselle Bonilla's debut feature, The Musical, up my alley. It follows a grouchy, discontented middle school teacher (Will Brill) who puts on a petty musical to sabotage his boss (Rob Lowe) for dating his ex (Gillian Jacobs). I mean, if you fumbled Gillian Jacobs and lost her to Rob Lowe, you might as well draw the curtains on life itself. If anything, The Musical serves as a reason why straight men should not be drama teachers. Bonilla’s dark comedy features a strong lead performance from Will Brill and a confident directorial debut, but Alexander Heller’s mediocre screenplay saddles the film with an unlikable protagonist and only sporadic laughs.
Image copyright (©) Courtesy of Sundance Institute
MPA Rating: N/A
Runtime: 1 Hour and 22 Minutes
Language: English
Production Companies: Megamix, Unapologetic Projects, Sequel
Distributor: N/A
Director: Giselle Bonilla
Screenwriter: Alexander Heller
Cast: Will Brill, Gillian Jacobs, Rob Lowe
U.S Release Date: N/A
Doug Leibowitz (Brill), a frustrated and irritable middle school drama teacher, believes that he can win back Abigail (Gillian Jacobs), his ex-girlfriend who broke up with him, and a residency application can fulfill his dream of becoming a Broadway playwright. He also despises Brady (Rob Lowe), the principal, for his relentless efforts to secure the school a Blue Ribbon of Academic Excellence award for his own benefit rather than for the kids. Nevertheless, Doug becomes enraged upon discovering that Abigail and Brady are dating and substitutes the school musical, West Side Story, with an original musical about 9/11.
The Musical mistakes Doug’s cruelty for comedy.
Doug is that kind of character whose portrait would be fun in a 2000s/2010s studio comedy. Cameron Diaz in Bad Teacher is legitimately funny and faintly relatable in her cynical nature while surrounded by an ensemble of quirky characters. Similarly, Fist Fight balances its abrasive personalities with Charlie Day’s anxious pushover, giving the comedy a clear foil.
The Musical, however, lacks that balance. Alexander Heller’s script centers almost entirely on Doug, an unpleasant and increasingly unsettling character. Framed like a fable, Doug narrates his journey to self-actualization, but the film never provides an emotional foothold or any real reason to root for his petty, one-sided beef. There’s a timely idea buried here about teachers projecting their insecurities onto students rather than shaping young minds, but Heller pushes Doug’s cruelty too far for the comedy to work. He berates them and treats their emotions as obstacles to his own ego, making the character more uncomfortable than amusing.
Doug is stagnant with no discernible growth throughout his revenge musical production. The film introduces characters such as Little LMG (Nevada Jose), Doug's right-hand stagehand, who looks up to him because of his assuredness, and Lata (Melanie Herrera), who aspires for the lead role as Maria and subsequently appreciates him because he admires her manipulative persistence in achieving her goals. However, the mentor-pupil relationship is not particularly genuine or even endearing. Because of said stagnation, Heller's script squanders the opportunity for even a begrudging sense of warmth between Doug and the kids.
The same notion carries over to Doug’s personal life, as it never convinces you that Abigail and Doug were ever a couple to begin with. All their interactions, with Doug often acting entitled and stubborn while Abigail tries to be cordial and kind, make me go, “Girl, what made you want him in the first place?” Maybe she only ever saw him without the glasses – because, let's face it, Doug looks good without them, even though he's still the worst. He truly lacks any redeeming factors because, God, I'm fucking tired of watching another entitled dude acting horrendously and trying to manipulate me to root for him as an antihero when I’m on the side of his oppressors, if anything else.
Will Brill commits fully, even when the script doesn’t.
The Musical’s narrative is sometimes aimless in pacing, keen on elaborating Doug's contemplation on his struggles and imposing that selfishness in his production process and its teachings. It diminishes the significance of supporting actors Lowe and Jacobs, as they were not utilized to their fullest extent due to the significant amount of time spent on Doug.
The issues I have with Doug lie squarely with the screenplay, not with Will Brill’s central performance. Brill fully commits to Doug as a detestable, insufferable figure, disappearing into the character’s ugliness with impressive conviction. In many ways, the performance is stronger than the material surrounding it.
Bonilla’s visual flair gives The Musical its best laughs.
The Musical is enhanced by Giselle Bonilla's exceptional direction, which demonstrates a keen sense of style and comedy in timing that the screenplay itself does not possess. She pairs deadpan humor with a giallo-tinged aesthetic, using stylized color palettes and soft, gliding camera movement to give the film an unexpectedly striking look. DP Tu Do shoots it like Suspiria by way of Wet Hot American Summer, and the blend feels surprisingly natural. With hints of psychotic behavior, it also contributes to Doug's personalized revenge fantasy headspace that the viewer is thrust into.
The real problem is that the script rarely gives Doug anything funny to balance out his nastiness. Most of my laughs came from visual gags and sudden reveals rather than the dialogue itself, particularly during the film’s outrageous 9/11-themed musical finale and the performances from the young cast, who inject a welcome sense of energy. However, I was thoroughly entertained; it clocks in at 82 minutes, and that final reveal is downright hysterical. If anything, the short runtime works against it – the climactic stage show feels rushed, and the film might have benefited from lingering longer on the kids actually performing the musical rather than cutting quickly through the moment with a breezy needle drop.
Final Statement
Despite Bonilla’s stylish direction and Will Brill’s impressively abrasive performance, The Musical is weighed down by a script that gives its lead neither humor nor humanity. Ironically, the kids prove far more compelling than their teacher, leaving the film feeling like a promising production trapped inside a middling screenplay.
