A Little White Lie (2023)
Directed by Michael Maren
Written by Michael Maren
Starring Kate Hudson, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson
Release Date March 3rd, 2023
Published March 1st, 2023
Michael Shannon has made his name as an actor by being wildly unique and unpredictable. Those qualities are on incredible display in the new comedy, A Little White Lie. Here, Michael Shannon stars as a man named Shriver, a janitor living a life of desperation and boredom in New York City. Schriver's life is upended when he receives a letter from a college professor, Professor Simone Cleary (Kate Hudson), inviting him to speak at a prestigious but struggling literary conference in Utah.
This is a little odd as Schriver doesn't remember having written a famous bestseller before pulling a J.D Salinger and disappearing from the literary world. Nevertheless, with prodding from his best friend Lenny (Mark Boone Junior), Schriver accepts the invitation and plans to pretend that he is this mysterious missing author. It's helpful to his scheme that no one has ever seen the famous Schriver, aside from a dark and broody photograph on the back cover of his novel.
Arriving for the conference we meet the rest of the cast of this unusual comedy. Joining Kate Hudson is Don Johnson as a degenerate fellow professor with a deep admiration for Schriver and his writing. Aja Naomi King, known for role on TV's How to Get Away With Murder, plays a fellow author named Blythe Brown who is suspicious of Shriver from the moment she meets him. And rounding out the main cast are Da'Vine Joy Randolph as a Schriver super-fan and Romy Byrne as Teresa, Professor Cleary's assistant who appears to be in charge of exposition in several scenes.
There are elements of A Little White Lie that don't work like a highly reductive cameo by beloved character actress Wendie Malick. Malick plays a patron of the college literary department who has a legendary habit of sleeping with famous authors. That's the joke, she sleeps with authors. She's an older woman who likes to have sex and for reasons unexplained, t
his is supposed to be funny. Neither Michael Shannon as the object of her desire or Malick herself are given any time to flesh out what might be funny about this beyond the idea of it.
Find my full length review at Geeks.Media
