美国国家公共电台 NPR Rumors Of The Death Of The Rom-Com Are Greatly Exaggerated

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SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Here's a recipe for romantic comedy. Take two people...

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "WHEN HARRY¹ MET SALLY...")

MICHELLE NICASTRO: (As Amanda) Sally, this is Harry Burns. Harry, this is Sally Albright.

BILLY CRYSTAL: (As Harry Burns) Nice to meet you.

SIMON: ...Then put up an obstacle to keep them from falling in love...

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "COMING TO AMERICA")

SHARI HEADLEY: (As Lisa McDowell) What about the woman you're supposed to marry?

JAMES EARL JONES: (As King Jaffe Joffer) I do not love her. Why do you think I came to America?

HEADLEY: (As Lisa McDowell) Your father told me to sow your royal oats.

SIMON: ...And emotion.

(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT")

CLARK GABLE: (As Peter Warne) A normal human being couldn't live under the same roof with her without going nutty. She's my idea of nothing.

WALTER CONNOLLY: (As Alexander Andrews) I asked you a simple question. Do you love her?

GABLE: (As Peter Warne) Yes.

SIMON: And voila - box office gold - that was "When Harry Met Sally...," "Coming To America" and "It Happened One Night" - all classic rom-coms. But Hollywood's love affair with love affairs has had its ups and downs ever since Clark Gable went on the road with Claudette Colbert in 1934. There were no major studio rom-coms released in 2017. But like any good love affair, love always wins. And boy, is the rom-com back with success of "Crazy Rich Asians" and Netflix's "Set It Up" and "To All The Boys I Loved Before." We wondered. We wished. We hoped. Is the rom-com back? To answer that, we call in Linda Holmes, host of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour and a romantic yourself. Aren't you, Linda?

LINDA HOLMES, BYLINE²: I really am. What a wonderful introduction and group of clips. Now I want to go watch them all.

SIMON: How do we define the rom-com?

HOLMES: I think you have your totally rom-coms like "When Harry Met Sally..." But actually "Crazy Rich Asians" has some other elements. It's also a family story. It has some drama in it. So it really does vary. And I think you have your meet-cute, which is your - they bump into each other, or they meet under strange circumstances. Then you have your terrible obstacle that keeps them apart, which can be anything from she falls in love with his brother while he's in a coma³. That's "While You Were Sleeping..."

SIMON: Right. Yes...

HOLMES: ...One of my favorites.

SIMON: ...Sandra Bullock - it's a great one, too. Yeah.

HOLMES: One of my favorites - or something more kind of normal, like differences in class or in profession. Like in "You've Got Mail," she's a little bookstore owner. And he's a big bookstore owner. Then you have a bunch of banter⁴ and conversation. And then at the end, they get together. And that gets you a romantic comedy right there.

SIMON: Yeah. I'm tearing right now.

HOLMES: I know - me, too - me, too.

SIMON: And it's a genre⁵ that's helped create some of Hollywood's biggest stars - right? - I mean, Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, Rock Hudson. We could go on.

HOLMES: Absolutely.

SIMON: Meg Ryan...

HOLMES: Yes.

SIMON: ...Tom Hanks, for that matter.

HOLMES: Absolutely - Julia Roberts. Absolutely.

SIMON: What led to this slow slide of the rom-com?

HOLMES: I think that most genres⁶ that are aimed at adults that fall between big-budget studio blockbusters and little, tiny indies - most of those genres have taken something of a beating in the last 10 to 20 years, whether it's live-action family movies or sports movies or adult dramas. And I think romantic comedies got somewhat bound up in that. I also think it's much harder to create sweetheart actresses who are a big part of this because there's a - kind of a brutal⁷ cycle of building up and then tearing down actresses. We don't like her. She has a bad personality.

SIMON: Oh, yeah - the Anne Hathaway stuff.

HOLMES: The Anne Hathaway stuff - also Jennifer Lawrence - a variety of actresses have really kind of been ground down by those kind of phenomena⁸. And I think it makes it a lot harder to create the next Julia Roberts, the next Meg Ryan. And you'll notice that the two female leads of "Crazy Rich Asians" and "To All The Boys I've Loved Before" are both women of color who haven't been through this cycle yet - Constance Wu and Lana Condor⁹. And it'll be interesting to see how they progress through that cycle that's been so hard on a lot of other actresses in the past.

SIMON: There were critiques that the genre was getting tired?

HOLMES: Yes. There's such a fine line between a glut¹⁰ and a golden age. And I think...

SIMON: (Laughter).

HOLMES: ...If you look at the time between the late '80s and maybe the very early aughts - the time that brought you "When Harry Met Sally..." and "Sleepless¹¹ In Seattle, "The Princess Bride" and movies like that - but also a lot of really forgettable romantic comedies. I think there did come to be a sort of an expectation that certain stars were just churning them out. And I think that developed during the early aughts.

SIMON: We should note. The rebirth of the genre - if that's what we're looking at right now - is headed by diverse cast, isn't it?

HOLMES: Hundred percent - and I think that one of the things you see there is Netflix, in particular, is zeroing in both on the underserved romantic comedy audience and the underserved audiences of color. So when you get that put together, a movie like "To All The Boys I've Loved Before," from the book by Jenny Han, is both a high school rom-com for people who miss those, and it's also a movie with an Asian-American cast - and which also does something that Hollywood hasn't been doing enough. So Netflix in some ways is trying to fill those spaces where studios aren't making films.

SIMON: Can I tell you what my favorite rom-com is?

HOLMES: I will be so sad if you don't.

SIMON: "Tootsie."

HOLMES: Really?

SIMON: Yes, exactly.

HOLMES: Scott Simon.

SIMON: And it has the advantage of being kind of gender-bending to make it ultimately contemporary. Yes.

HOLMES: It is gender-bendy.

SIMON: Sure.

HOLMES: How do you feel about Cleveland (laughter)?

SIMON: That's what the television cameraman says when he pulls back, taking in Dustin Hoffman dressed up as Dorothy...

HOLMES: ...To make her more attractive.

SIMON: Yeah. I love that film. They meet-cute because...

HOLMES: Right.

SIMON: Well, actually, he meets her at a New York party, and she wants nothing to do with him. And then when they meet later, he's impersonating as a woman. And that certainly is an obstacle to romance, isn't it?

HOLMES: Couldn't be meet-cute-ier (ph) - but I think that's a great example too of a film that has other elements. It has other pieces. But then that romantic comedy thread runs through the middle of it.

SIMON: While we have you and all of your expertise¹² in our studio, any other rom-coms that maybe aren't as familiar you want to fill us into?

HOLMES: Well, if you haven't checked out the Netflix film "Set It Up," that's a very traditional rom-com that they put out a while ago that a lot of people were super into. I really liked "Trainwreck," which came out a couple of years ago with Amy Schumer and Bill Hader which didn't get a lot of play. But I loved that movie. And I think it has some great rom-com elements...

SIMON: And LeBron James is in that film...

HOLMES: LeBron James is great in that movie.

SIMON: ...Robbed of an Oscar, by the way.

HOLMES: Robbed of an Oscar - couldn't agree more - couldn't agree more.

SIMON: But he's genuinely good in that film.

HOLMES: Oh, he's extremely funny in that film, playing himself.

SIMON: Yeah.

HOLMES: He could go have a totally successful comedy career any time he decides that he doesn't want to make a billion, swillion (ph) dollars playing basketball anymore.

SIMON: Linda Holmes, of NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour, thanks so much.

HOLMES: Thanks, Scott.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "ISN'T IT ROMANTIC")

ELLA FITZGERALD: (Singing) Isn't it romantic?