The Birdcage
Mike Nichols
This film will screen on
Sunday, January 25, 2015
Sunday, January 25, 2015
This 1996 adaptation of the iconic French farce La Cage aux Folles, directed by the dearly departed Mike Nichols, is as outrageous as the 1978 French-Italian film and the original 1973 stage play, and with a Jewish twist. Robin Williams and Nathan Lane star as the flamboyant South Beach couple whose straight son brings his fiancée and her ultraconservative (and not even a little Jewish) parents to dinner. Williams and Lane transform into a happy heterosexual couple for the occasion, with Lane in drag, Gentile-izing themselves in the bargain from Goldman to Coleman (“the D is silent,” says Lane’s Albert). Mayhem and hilarity ensue. The outstanding cast also includes Gene Hackman, Dianne Wiest, and Hank Azaria.