“Bradley Cooper finds success with a smaller scale and an introspective look at finding yourself in Is This Thing On?”
- Stellar ensemble performances
- Timeless look at a midlife crisis
- Never too serious
- Framework is too familiar
- Can be unremarkable in conclusion
Bradley Cooper began his directing career with two bombastic portraits of artists that earned him the reputation of an “artiste” and someone who wants to win Oscars. Cooper’s fans will be surprised by his third venture, Is This Thing On?, a more scaled-back take on someone looking for meaning in life when things feel like rock bottom.
Is This Thing On? stars Will Arnett as Alex Novak and Laura Dern as Tess Novak, a newly separated couple navigating the harsh landscape of maintaining a working relationship for the sake of their children and friends. As the decision weighs on them, they both look for direction in life. Tess dips back into her volleyball roots, and Alex stumbles into a newfound passion for stand-up comedy.
Is This Thing On feels far more like a Noah Baumbach movie than anything Cooper has ever done, and I mean that as a high compliment. The movie still maintains Cooper’s strong ability to portray human emotions, but it contains a more earnest heart than his two previous outings.
A coming-of-middle-age film
The movie is somehow made by people much deeper into their lives, but it feels spiritually attributed to a much younger generation of characters. It is about feeling lost in your life when purpose feels more mechanical than it does passionate. Movies like Frances Ha or Licorice Pizza strangely feel more entwined with Is This Thing On? than Marriage Story.
The film smartly drops you at the very end of the marriage with no preceding incidents or trouble to give a direct reason for this happening. Tess was confident in the mutual decision, but Alex felt that death would feel sweeter than separation. Divorce creates a sense of yearning often felt more in youth and inexperience — one that we were never able to see but can be felt from both inside and outside of the relationship.
Alex — freshly moved out and into an apartment — finds stand-up comedy purely by trying to avoid cover to get into the bar above NYC’s famous Comedy Cellar. After a few tries and chuckles, his accident turns into a therapeutic vent session masquerading as a comedy set. These sets act as a catalyst to help him blossom into a new man with a new sense of self and community to bring his emotional corpse back to life. His midlife crisis is closer to the decisions of a college-aged transplant looking to fit in than a man searching for more.
I, someone in their late 20s living in NYC, felt a grand connection to this despite not having a kid or being divorced.
Is this acting on? Yes
The belief that Alex could fail upwards in comedy is attributed to a career-best performance from Arnett. He is told, “You’re terrible at stand-up, but you have heart,” and the audience can feel that in Arnett both on and off stage. A man who desperately wants his life to work but also can’t seem to get out of his own way — you root for him while never truly seeing him as the complete person he wants to be. Arnett brings a vulnerability and passion to each scene that de-ages him and puts him behind the pack, but certainly in the Oscar race.
The chemistry between him and Dern is palpable. Small inflections in their conversations and brief physical ticks that only feel natural to a real couple. Dern’s headstrong character’s personality also perfectly contradicts Arnett’s more young adult pursuits, providing a balance where her sense of wandering is felt from a nostalgic wish to be back at her peak and no longer an appendage of his. They are so different yet so much the same; it is like watching 2 people try their best to blow out a never-ending birthday candle.
Side characters bring the levity as the comedic shepherds for the two leads. There are plenty of cameos from professional comics and even one from an amateur that is impossible to guess, but the funniest role goes to the director himself. Cooper knocks it out of the park as a hopeful pothead and best friend to Alex. Cooper is a hilarious combination of how the public perceived him prior to directing (goofball but talented) and after (self-serious). His in-the-cloud performance is a reminder of what made him famous in the first place, and viewers will love the spacey antics.
Cooper gets intimate with his directing
Any film that focuses on the topic of divorce is going to feel characteristically close, but Cooper invites the audience in with his directing. The camera is almost never in a wide shot, which gives this leering sense of intrusion upon the lives of the characters. It is constantly in the face of the characters. Conversations never have the room to fill up space, and instead, the audience is often left to feel like they are directly in the middle of a marital squabble or buddy-buddy interrogation.
Arnett’s standup performances are often done in a single take, following him from the stairs to the stage. The camera is pointed directly at his face rather than the usual standup stylings of having the camera in the crowd. It adds a sense of pressure while he attempts to figure it all out, but as laughs slowly trickle out, the framing helps with the exhale as his self-purging becomes a comfort.
While the enclosed story and visual structure work, they will also be a turn-off for many. The film doesn’t break ground in the comedic drama landscape, and the story of divorce is at this point a trope for many films. The directing reflects Alex’s self-imposed wandering, whereas Cooper’s version of standup is a toned-down personal film. Those wanting his brash grand visions of artists may come away disappointed and confused by this far more hands-on flair.
Should you watch Is This Thing On?
Despite Cooper scaling back, this feels like two steps forward in his directing career. The stripped-down portrait of two individuals wishing they could make their relationship work is not his career best, but it brings a new vision for what he can do. Scaled-down intimate features are where the acting shines brightest.
The movie is never sappy for the sake of it, and it never makes you feel bad for anyone, even at rock bottom. It just wants you to ask the question: who do you want to be unhappy with?
I was able to see Is This Thing On? at the World Premiere for the New York Film Festival. Searchlight Pictures will release the movie in theaters on December 19, 2025.
