SHIVA
BABY
With pre-recorded Q&A!
Tuesday, August 22 at 7:30pm
Members
$10 / Public $15
Featuring
a pre-recorded Q&A with director Emma Seligman and star Rachel Sennott,
recorded live at the Laemmle Royal in Los Angeles on July 3rd, 2023.
The
Indie Spirit Award-winning sensation, Shiva Baby, is heading back
to the big screen ahead of the release of Emma Seligman’s sophomore
feature, Bottoms (also starring & co-written by Sennott).
Shiva Baby
focuses on twentysomething Danielle (Rachel Sennott), a perennial
student who’s been lying to her supportive but overbearing parents about her
faltering academic career. Then again, she has a lot of secrets she’s keeping,
including her relationship with an older man, Max (Danny Deferrari), who
also gives her money. Hauled off to a shiva by her parents, she’s mortified to
encounter both Max and her embittered ex Maya (Molly Gordon), followed
by other people who make things increasingly more awkward. Much to her chagrin,
she finds out that many of them have secrets of their own.
Sharp-witted
and hilarious, Shiva Baby is a caustically affectionate comedy
about tightly knit families and communities, and the comfort and anguish
they’re often responsible for. Seligman structures the film expertly: Danielle
lurches from one potentially catastrophic encounter to another — each one
threatening to expose her multiple fabrications — while navigating spilled
drinks, wailing babies, and an endless string of friends and relations anxious
to give advice. Seligman’s stellar ensemble cast, led by Sennott and including Polly
Draper and Fred Melamed, is spot-on. (USA/Canada, 2020, 77 min.,
color, DCP)
"Sennott is a revelation... [and] she’s surrounded by
some of the best character actors in the game."—NYTimes Critic's Pick
"A perfectly engineered and performed piece of comic
cringe."—Helen
Shaw, NYMag
