The 2000s Movie Project: 'Isn't She Great' Starring Bette Midler

Isn't She Great (2000)

Directed by Andrew Bergman

Written by Paul Rudnick

Starring Bette Midler. Nathan Lane, Stockard Channing, David Hyde Pierce

Release Date January 28th, 2000

Published September 20th, 2022

I went into to watching Isn't She Great with a bad attitude. I've read a number of other critics who despised this movie. They decried what they claimed are numerous inaccuracies, they called Bette Midler's performance overly broad and cartoonish, and they barely mentioned the sweet romance at the heart of the movie. I was fully prepared to write a negative review of Isn't She Great and then I watched the movie and I was unexpectedly charmed. Perhaps its because I don't know much about the real Jacqueline Susann, or maybe I am just feeling generous, but I genuinely enjoyed most of Isn't She Great.

Jaqueline Susann was a striver. Living in New York City, she felt that stardom was her birthright. When she failed to achieve fame by any means necessary, she dramatically walked into a lake ala Virginia Woolf only to find the water was barely knee deep. It's here where she meets the man who who would help make her dreams come through. Show business lifer, agent Irving Mansfield fell in love at first sight with Jacqueline Susann and after witnessing her quite funny and failing attempt at a dramatic death, he rescues her with promises of stardom.

Their partnership got off to a slow start. Irving got her on television and got her gigs on commercials but Jacqueline's strength was her off the cuff wit, something she could not highlight on overly serious game shows or the confines of a live commercial advertisement. Finding little success on TV, Irving launches a new plan, a book. With support from Jacqueline's best friend, Florence Maybelle,. played by a brilliant, scene stealing Stockard Channing, Irving pitches Jacqueline the idea to write a novel.

Jacqueline is immediately opposed to the idea, she claims that she doesn't have anything to say in a novel. Then Irving points out her incredible true stories about the dark side of Hollywood and Jacqueline is intrigued. Indeed, she's got thousands of darkly funny stories about Hollywood from her own experience and the experiences of her vast network of friends. It will require her to tell stories that her friends might prefer she did not tell, but what does she have to lose.

Famously, Susann's dark comic story of the Hollywood underbelly, filled with truths and half truths about barely disguised Hollywood figures became the bestseller, The Valley of the Dolls. The book was an immediate sensation and soon, thanks to Irving, Jacqueline has the love and celebrity that she's always dreamed of. Naturally, this still being a movie, there is a false crisis that will divide our central couple before we get to our based on a true story ending, and that convenionalism does hold the movie back a little, but it's not a death knell.

Bette Midler and Nathan Lane make a surprisingly adorable couple in Isn't She Great. The chemistry between Midler and lane is lovely, platonically friendly growing into a chaste romance. It's charming watching Irving pine for Jackie and then try to move heaven and earth to achieve her dreams. By the same token, Midler is great at being first oblivious to Irving before seeing him as useful and then growing to rely on him, appreciate him and then love him. That's wonderfully complicated road to character growth and I really enjoyed that.

Isn't She Great isn't written or directed with a great deal of innovation. The film holds to a rather strict biopic structure. That said, the film is rather breezy and doesn't drag at all. The film is brisk thanks to the performance of Bette Midler who plays Jacqueline Susann as the oversized personality one might assume she was from her brazen, barely veiled novels. It's a blowsy, blowhard performance by Midler with dramatic flourishes that I found humorous and endearing rather than merely hammy. The character, as essayed by Midler, is supposed to be hammy. That's a feature and not a bug in my estimation.

Nathan Lane grounds Isn't She Great with his devoted sweetness and pugnacious charm. He's in love from the first moment he meets Jacqueline Susann and has an arc that is about winning her over to see how much he loves and cares about her. I enjoyed watching him dote on Jacqueline and work hard on her behalf, expecting nothing in return other than the chance to be around her more and bask in her glory. The romance has a lovely undercurrent of non-creepy devotion that makes it charming.

I can't speak to whether Isn't She Great is accurate to the life of Jacqueline Susann. My knowledge of Jacqueline Susann is limited to having seen a few interviews on Johnny Carson. That said, if the movie is not accurate to Susann's life, that's rather appropriate. She reportedly hated the adaptation of The Valley of the Dolls for the big screen so a movie disregarding her real life story is almost a meta gag if you think about it. That said, I think the movie is incredibly flattering to the author. Perhaps that's the inaccuracy, maybe she was awful and people thought the movie should have reflected that.

22 years ago, I passed up an assignment to write about Isn't She Great because I was not a fan of Bette Midler and it looked like a movie I was going to hate. I hadn't softened on that stance as I went to watch it this time but I've apparently gone soft in my middle age. Instead of dismissing Isn't She Great and suffering through it, I found myself charmed from the first moment to the last in the most unexpected and welcome ways. The film is far from great but it's a solid watch with terrific moments, a well built central relationship and some wonderfully witty banter. Stockard Channing is especially great as a character who wanders into scenes slightly inebriated, says something scathing and hilarious and ducks out before she can overstay her welcome. I want Stockard Channing to play this character in every movie.

I am quite surprised to recommend Isn't She Great for anyone interested in Bette Midler, Jackie Susann, Valley of the Dolls or Stockard Channing being iconic. Find my archive of more than 20 years and nearly 2000 movie reviews at SeanattheMovies.blogspot.com. Follow me on Twitter at PodcastSean for my new reviews and observations and follow the archive blog for reviews from the past 20 years at SeanattheMovies. Listen to me talk about movies on the Everyone's a Critic Movie Review Podcast on your favorite podcast listening app. And, if you've enjoyed what you've read, consider subscribing to my work here on Vocal. You can also support my work by making a monthly pledge or a one time tip below. Thanks!