Special Exhibit: WAITRESS

 

Year: 2007

Duration: 104 minutes

Where to watch: Disney+ (STAR), Hulu, Amazon Prime, Apple iTunes

 

I’ve always liked Keri Russell, and after her wonderful role in The Americans, I absolutely love her. However, I had never checked out one of her classic films, Waitress, until about a month ago, when Disney+ launched STAR and I was looking for a new film to try out the platform. Even though romantic comedy dramas are a hit-or-miss for me, I decided to give it a go out of deference towards Russell and because I was curious about the director and the tragedy surrounding her.

It’s impossible to watch Waitress without being constantly reminded of the heartbreaking story of director Adrianne Shelly. Already a cult actress in the early 90s, she had also turned to screenwriting and directing. Waitress is indeed not only directed by Shelly: she also wrote it and stars in it as one of the most memorable characters.

Sadly, just over two months before the film’s premiere at Sundance (a lifelong dream of Shelly), the young filmmaker was cruelly murdered on her home after a botched robbery, and hung in her bathroom in a staged suicide, where her husband found her. She also left behind a 2-years-old daughter, who also appears in Waitress. I'm not telling you all of this to be morbid, but because it will condition your emotional response when watching the film; particularly the scenes featuring Shelley as one of the waitresses who work with Keri Russell’s titular one.

Said waitress is Jenna, a woman working at a humble diner where she also is bakes pies of her own invention, something for which she has such skills that everyone falls in love with them. Her home life is a wreck: she’s married to an abusive but needy husband (Jeremy Sisto), whom she’s trying to leave until an unwanted pregnancy gets in the way.

Jenna then meets her new obstetrician (Nathan Fillion), and they become mutually attracted, though he’s also married. Through the film, the young waitress has to discover her own worth, as well as her feelings towards both men and her unborn baby.

Though not perfect, in the end I was quite satisfied with the film, enough to think I should mention it here. It’s a pleasant little movie which makes you understand how powerless a woman can feel in certain circumstances, and yet it deals with that hard topic by never forgetting to be funny and a bit whimsical, though never cartoonish. The performances are all on point, and Russell is great as expected.

It really makes you quite angry and pained to know that Adrianne Shelly lost her life in such a senseless crime when she had such a promising career both as a performer and as a filmmaker.