Movie Review: 'Tankhouse' is a Loving Send Up of Theater Performers

Tankhouse is a comic romp within the weird world of grown up theater kids. The film stars Stephen Friedrich as Tucker and Tara Holt as his lover and muse, Sandrene. Together the couple hopes to change theater presentation forever with their immersive style of drama. Things get off to a good start but go bad very quickly. During their very first immersive theater presentation, a member of the very small audience dies. The woman was very old and seemed to happily participate in the immersive experience but regardless, her death gets Tucker and Sandrene blackballed from New York Theater by Tucker’s beloved mentor, Buford (Christopher Lloyd).

Though Buford is behind getting Tucker and Sandrene tossed out of the theater world, he nevertheless is able to offer Tucker advice. He tells him to go out into the world and find out what theater really means to him. Buford relates a story, re-told in a delightfully strange animated segment, about how he taught theater in the jungles of Siberia. If you know why that’s funny, then you know. I’m not going to explain it. Tucker needs to go out into the world and find his Siberian jungle.

Kismet occurs when Sandrene’s parents, played by Joey Lauren Adams and Andy Buckley, cut off Sandrene’s funding. The family is well off and have funded the immersive theater and Sandrene’s acting career for some time. Now they are finally putting their foot down, Sandrene can move home or go on without their money to help. Mom does offer one caveat, back in Sandrene’s hometown in Fargo, North Dakota, a theater competition is about to begin. Whoever wins the competition will get to take over and run a lovely looking old theater and run their own productions there.

Fargo isn’t exactly Siberia, though in the winter there are similarities. Tucker and Sandrene finally agree to move to Fargo and try to make a go of it with a small town theater troupe. It won’t be easy however, the town has another, relatively well established theater group. This group, under the leadership of Sandrene’s former High School acting teacher, Morten (Richard Kind), has already recruited the best local actors for their production of The Pirates of Penzance. This leaves Tucker and Sandrene to seek out regular folks who they might mold into actors.

My description of Tankhouse only covers the basic fish out of water premise. The movie has a very different tone, one that is whimsical, weird and charming. Tucker and Sandrene are a little like parodies of pretentious artists but I enjoyed how they never go completely over the top. Stephen Friedrich’s Tucker is pouty and dramatic but Friedrich makes it work by effortlessly communicating how Tucker’s arrogance will be his downfall. Sandrene has fewer traits than Tucker, she’s not given as much to do, but she’s game for throwing herself into whatever idea Tucker has cooked up and the energy of the two leads works wonders.

Directed and co-written by Noam Tomaschoff, Tankhouse never overplays its hand. The film is savvy in presenting these weird New York theater performers as outsiders, in classic fish out of water style, but with a theatrical flourish. These characters are ripe for ridicule but Tomaschoff and co-writer Chelsea Frei have a healthy eye for puncturing the pomposity of their theater snobs but never by taking cheap shots or undermining our affection for this odd duo. It's a deft piece of writing and direction that allows for wonderful flights of weird fancy while having a strong central narrative to hold it all together.

The ensemble that our central couple cobbles together in Tankhouse, out of the oddballs and outcasts at a local beer hall, is a terrific group of weirdos who make Fargo seem like Austin, Texas or Portland, Oregon, big cities with a reputation for keeping things weird. The Fargo of Tankhouse is imagined as a place where art and artists are not only welcome, but have become a serious problem with their over the top drama.

My favorite scene in Tankhouse, even if it is one slightly familiar from other comedies set in strange niche worlds, involves Tucker and Morten competing, street gang, West Side Story style, in dueling performances of the Pirates of Penzance song Modern Major General Song. The competition involves singing the song at top speed until your opponent can no longer keep up and it plays out like a scene from the dance movie You Got Served where Dancers compete until they can’t anymore. It may be a very familiar comic conceit but whether I have yet to tire of this particular gag or I enjoy the familiarity of it, I laughed and was delighted by it.

Tankhouse is a consistently funny and weird movie. I was delighted throughout. The absurd characters and outlandish theatrics are wonderfully grounded and held up by the central conflicted romance between Tucker and Sandrene. As real life issues push them apart and they struggle to stay connected, the rest of the movie soars around them into delightful weirdness. The supporting players, including Austin Crute, Joe Adler, Sarah Yarkin, and Luke Spencer Roberts never fail to get a smile and a laugh but the standout is Devere Rogers as an actor so intense that he’s gone blind and somehow been banned from performing in 47 different states. He’s mostly not a character but a series of quirks but it worked on me, I loved everything he did.

Tankhouse is a lot of fun. It’s not a parody of theater or theater kids but a loving and devoted send up that all theater kids would enjoy while providing more than enough to appeal to the non-theater kid audience. The film is just a lot of fun, that's the most important thing. The film has a personality, a strong sense of the weird, and just a touch of the absurd all surrounding a love story with a good deal of challenges and a not so predictable finish.

Tankhouse arrives on Video On-Demand rental on Friday, May 13th, 2022.