Dear god, Drew Barrymore interviewed the Dear Evan Hansen cast as Josie from Never Been Kissed
This Drew Barrymore Show clip with Ben Platt is hard to watch, but harder to look away from
Film Features Drew Barrymore
It’s been a minute since we checked in on The Drew Barrymore Show, which—even after having taken clear steps to minimize the sheer, beautiful strangeness of its first few weeks on the air—remains one of the most authentically odd things going in day time talk. Case in point: Barrymore’s decision to interview the cast of Dear Evan Hansen recently, not as herself, but as her character Josie Geller from 1999's Never Been Kissed. Prom dress and fake braces and everything. Swear to god.
Credit where it’s due: This particular choice—i.e., reprising the role of a character who semi-convincingly infiltrates a high school as an adult—does not appear, as one might assume, to be an elaborate troll-job on Ben Platt, whose current bearded look on the DEH promotional circuit can only be viewed as an effort to distance himself from all those “How do you do, fellow kids”/“Reminds me of the girl from Orphan” jokes people have been making since the film premiered. As with all things Barrymore, her enjoyment of the original Broadway play, of Platt, and of the film, feels almost blindingly sincere, even as she cheerfully snort-laughs her way through questions to Platt, Julianne Moore, and a clearly very bemused Amandla Stenberg.
(Brief math interlude, just because it blew our minds: Platt, who turns 29 today, is five years older than Barrymore was when she filmed Never Been Kissed, despite the fact that she was playing a 25-year-old, and he’s supposed to be playing an actual high school student. )
And, you know what? Like a lot of Barrymore Show content, once you crack through the initial cringe layers of the performance, the underlying sub-strata is actually pretty sweet. (Also, Platt’s prom photo with high school friend Beanie Feldstein is actually fun!) It’s clear that the genesis of the bit comes first and foremost from the parallels Barrymore sees between Hansen and her own film, both of which tackle the dehumanizing effects of trying to forge a high school identity when you are also an obvious adult infiltrating those stratified social groups. (Whoops, started thinking about it again.) God bless this talk show, really. It’s just the weirdest damn thing.
43 Comments
Usually I can’t stand it when the AV Club beats a dead horse, but this whole Dear Evan Hansen fiasco is oddly compelling.
I don’t get why they’re covering it so much at all. As far as I can tell it’s not an LGBTQ+ thing and it’s loaded with bland white people. Is the original Broadway show really good or something?
I think they just saw how many clicks and comments the TIFF 2021 article and review got and decided to embrace it.
Why the hell does this guy say “god” six times in every article?
Once for every day of Creation.
He’s God’s publicist.
He’d capitalize God if he were God’s publicist. Or maybe he just doesn’t know how proper names work.
No. His name is Jehovah. Or maybe Yahweh. He is a “god”, supposedly, but that’s just his job and/or species. Also, he has no connection to British nobility, so he really isn’t a “lord” either.
In phrases like “dear God”, “God only knows”, or “God bless”, where you’re referring to God as though it’s a person, it should be capitalized like a proper name. Otherwise it just looks like you’re trying to be edgy or something.
Is there a problem with the word “god?” It’s a signifier like every other word in our language. The word “god” is part of our cultural lexicon. If I had a dollar for every time I heard the word “like” in a conversation I’d be a rich woman. The writer spells the word correctly and his sentence logic is correct (syntax), so I don’t know why you think it shouldn’t be in the text, Proofreader.
Literally!
God a problem?
Because he’s a shitty writer.
Drew Barrymore comes across as a nerd.But a lovable nerd who actually seems to enjoy her life and this career path as a talk show.Yeah, it’s cringe when it starts but it does start to be rather wholesome after a while.
I feel the exact same way with Vin Diesel.
Maybe one day one of my D&D games can be made into a movie series. If Vin Diesel can do it, why oh why can’t I?
I’m not watching a Vin Diesel talk show
You would. It’s too insane a concept NOT to watch.
Alright, but I’m hate-watching it. Like I did with Merlin.
If all he did was say “I am Groot” the entire time and his guests responded with regular conversation, then I’d be down.
If he’s gonna host as any of his monophrasal characters, my vote is for the Iron Gian. Each show can close out with “Su-per-man.”
I would, if he conducted interviews while dressed as Josie from “Never Been Kissed.”
<3 <3 <3
“Barrymore’s decision to interview the cast of Dear Evan Hansen recently, not as herself, but as her character Josie Geller from 1999’s Never Been Kissed.”This description, and the photo of Barrymore at the beginning of the article, all sound like the greatest SNL sketch that never was.
None of their writers could come up with something that loopy. Also, Chloe Fineman’s head might explode.
There’s nothing great about this. This sucks
She’s a national treasure.
You can say that again!
She’s a national treasure.
Thanks!
You can say that again!
What, twice wasn’t enough?!
Orange ya glad they didn’t say banana?
I can’t stop till I get enough and I just can’t enough….I just can’t enough…
I wish they leaned into the weirdness of it even more. I’d love a benignly Lynchian talk show hosted by Drew Barrymore.
You mean her show isn’t that already?Also I feel like a Lynch/Herzog collaboration with her would be the greatest thing ever made.
yessss, this is teetering into absurdity and I want her to push it even more. Barrymore is loveable and wholesome but she’s also got a darkness at the same time that I wish she used in her comedy more, because she is a great comedic actress.
This is really fucking with my perception of time and age. When Never Been Kissed came out I was 14 and felt Drew was so old that it was ridiculous for her to pose as a high schooler even though I was watching old “teens” in Dawson’s Creek et al. Turns out she was like 24. And then here I see that Beanie Feldstein went to school IRL with Old Man Hansen so I wiki and find out that when she played an actual high school senior in Booksmart two years ago she was 26!
She was an actual high school senior at age 26? That doesn’t sound very booksmart at all!
No thanks. I don’t look at Drew Barrymore’s show, because I like her and want to keep it that way.
Were we not aware this was a comedy bit and not just Drew being weird or was that intentionally left out to increase click counts?
I thought we took Drew being weird for granted
I feel like I’m simultaneously too old and too young for this