Crisis in Six Scenes

[The Narrator Returns]

I'm only on the second episode (the first was mediocre but tolerable), but I think I can say with some certainty that Allen reprising the "I'm forbidding you!" bit from Manhattan Murder Mystery nearly word-for-word, with half the energy level and a tenth the amount of laughs, is the saddest moment of his career.

[The Narrator Returns]

Okay, I've watched it all, and episodes two and three are awful, one and four are mediocre, and five and six are inexplicably really good. I'd still probably put it as my least favorite thing Allen has ever done, but I expected it to be a lot worse overall.

[ShellOilJunior]

This is bottom shelf Woody Allen. I have no problems with the casting. Cyrus is satisfactory, Elaine May is always fun, the old gals were hilarious and it's always good to see Rappaport (Even in such a small role). I thought the production was dull and checked my watch a few times. It's Allen's trademark neurosis/hypochondria/paranoia just in the 1960s. There are several riffs on classic Allen jokes on god and religion. All in all, it's Woody's weakest effort since Scoop (which is better than Crisis).

Crises appears like it was filmed as a feature and simply cut into 6 20-minute+ episodes.

[Noiradelic]

All in all, it's Woody's weakest effort since Scoop (which is better than Crisis).

Doesn't "weakest effort since" imply that Scoop is weaker? Or are you making some fine point I'm missing?

[Ribs]

"Weakest since" would not be an inclusive statement and therefore it is saying Scoop was his most recent thing worse than this. This is a common grammatical conception that drives me batty.

[swo17]

He's saying that Scoop is the last thing in the general vicinity of this degree of weakness, though this is even weaker.

[ShellOilJunior]

Has anyone else seen the show or are you gentlemen going to argue over semantics? If so, I can recommend a symposium.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

THR reported today that Crisis in Six Scenes cost $80 million.

To be fair, that $80m includes not just the production costs and but also licensing fees equivalent to most or all worldwide rights, possibly in perpetuity. But given that the production costs were probably similar to one of Allen's cheaper recent movies (let's say $10-15m), that's still a pretty hefty premium. Not that Amazon really worries much about turning a profit.

[mfunk9786]

Unrelatedly, THR reported today that Crisis in Six Scenes cost $80 million.

Did anyone here, um, watch that? That budget is wild and likely establishes it as the biggest failure of Allen’s career, right?

[knives]

How can you measure failure for something like that though?

[mfunk9786]

Level of interest even among Allen’s fanbase + reviews (very unkind in this case, particularly in the more forgiving world of television) + how much money was spent ($80-100 million, way over what Allen’s films typically cost) = seems like a runaway with that title if one is going by those metrics.

[Ribs]

Presumably Allen just really didn't want to do it but they offered him a payment of like $20 million and gave him a ton of other money to pad out the cast. I really can't begin to imagine what other than on-camera talent would cause it to get that high.

[The Narrator Returns]

I watched it, and I am just as baffled as you or anyone as to that cost. The money sure as hell wasn't on-screen (it's mostly set in one, not particularly elaborate, set, and it's maybe the least visually-ambitious thing Allen has ever made), so I can only guess the rest went into maintaining the furnace in Miley Cyrus's trailer.

[Michael Kerpan]

Maybe lots of the money went to "marketing"?

[swo17]

As someone just mentioned earlier on this page, that budget includes a lot more than just production costs, which were probably more like $10-15 million.

[movielocke]

Presumably Allen just really didn't want to do it but they offered him a payment of like $20 million and gave him a ton of other money to pad out the cast. I really can't begin to imagine what other than on-camera talent would cause it to get that high.

the big two, Amazon and Netflix, prepay residuals so that they don't ever have to pay them. A lot of people (like soderbergh were refusing to work with them because of the lack of residuals, so it seems their solution was massive wads of cash in lieu of residuals.

Allen has probably made twenty million in residuals from his top tier films like Annie hall, so I'm sure the number they asked for was near the top of what he's earned for his biggest hits. Then they paid it.

[knives]

I'm half way through and don't understand the negative reaction at all. Each episode has about six or seven hardy laughs along with a lot of chuckles. More interesting for me though is how intelligent and relevant the political commentary is. Despite, in a lamp shading way, the plot being some Honeymooners crap the story is one of Allen's most daring and outside of his comfort zone in his wacky fashion really digging into the battle of the generations. The show might as well be called Clinton v Bernie.

[therewillbeblus]

I enjoyed this too, and it's further evidence that Allen is incapable of making anything 'bad' in my eyes. I'll admit that he seems to be stretching his material here, and there are wonderful scenes like May's book club that should have been cut while they were soaring instead of petering out with humorless filler, pushing a great setup too far. The show combines a bunch of Allen's previous ideas re-hashed, but this works because he's planting them into a specific context and there's more to milk from their broad structures. Allen himself is pretty funny here, and his rapport with May grows into itself. While the show does ebb and flow, it ultimately sustains a decent rhythm, even if it never peaks beyond the opening introductions to each character. The very first scene with Allen at the barber is gold, and May's therapist session (well all of them) are so on point, naturally taken to comedic extremes (but barely, you'd be surprised) that Allen's years of therapy -including a lot of couples therapy, clearly- pay off in spades. The place to start on guacamole is genius and I can't think of a better and more honest way to make fun of couples in couples therapy without being unfairly mean.

[knives]

Also Woody Allen: action star.

[therewillbeblus]

Also Woody Allen: action star.

Yeah the fifth episode picked things up considerably and reminded me of Manhattan Murder Mystery, The Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Small Time Crooks, and the like. Definitely one of my favorite chapters, with a great transition into the sixth

Spoiler

"God I told Alan not to build a bomb without me there"

[knives]

It's such a dumb plot I love it. That stuff with the phone booth is so wonderfully idiotic.

[therewillbeblus]

Same, and when everyone's together at the end we get that culture clash of ignorance that's so relevant today, but played for laughs. I did appreciate the commentary on the divide between liberals of where the definitive moral line is on action, as if there is one. Also, you can't beat that last-minute cameo in the state trooper.