Morning Glory is a movie about the collision of two worlds: Ego and the fast-paced world of morning television. Meet Becky (McAdams). She's a driven, focused Executive Producer for a New Jersey morning show who has put in plenty of time to justify a promotion to Senior EP. When the time comes: No promotion. Uh-uh--no, instead, she's greeted with a pink slip. She's rightfully devastated, but finds her way to IBS in New York. Sure, it's a bigger stage, but the IBS morning show is dead last. It's cast of characters? Well, let's just say they need tweaking. Yadayadayada...tweak is exactly what Ms. Motivation does to the tune of a pretty funny and entertaining 95 minutes.
I worked in the media (radio) for five years (eight including college) and experienced some laughably large egos in that time. I knew Morning Glory would provide some laughs based on the trailers. At first, I was afraid that it was only going to be funny to me. Of course, this was based on those ego-centrics known as the "talent" and my previous experiences with these self-starved and over-inflated talkers. Wrong. This is a funny flick and the chuckles from the audience more than backed up that notion. Yes, Morning Glory is a series of ego-showdowns, therein lies the crux of its humor. There's Colleen Peck (Keaton) vs. Mike Pomroy (Ford). There's Peck versus the world and then there's Pomroy versus the universe. In the middle of it all is Becky...poor, driven Becky. She's just trying to put together some semblance of a competitive show that will help her make a mark in the news world. The big three (Keaton, Ford, McAdams) are great in this flick. Although I would have preferred to have seen a little more of Keaton, specifically the Peck versus Pomroy battle. It was fun stuff. Actually, I was expecting this movie to be more of a showcase for the potential Keaton and Ford dynamic. It wasn't, which is my only real disappointment. Sure Keaton is present throughout, but serves more of a background role than what I was anticipating. The story is more about Becky trying to get Pomroy to buy into her vision--something the hardliner news guy was not about to do on a fluffy morning show. I'll let you enjoy it from there.
It's 4.0 Stars in my book. I enjoyed it from start to finish. Maybe that's because it pokes fun at media ego types hyped beyond belief--which speaks volumes to my early career days and one reason I eventually wanted nothing to do with the production side of the business. If you're a fan of Keaton or Ford or need to see more of McAdams than Sherlock Holmes or The Notebook could deliver, then see it Big. If not, add it to your queue and enjoy some laughs around April when it hits Blockbuster.
True...OUT!
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