In these challenging times, a full distraction just doesn’t exist. But if you’re in search of an escape from reality, or at least an alternative to it, rom-com virtuoso Nancy Meyers has got you covered. Yes, you can binge the filmmaker’s eternal, aesthetically-delightful classics—Father of the Bride, The Parent Trap, The Holiday, or It’s Complicated, just to name a few—or you can take it a step further and screen the films that have inspired her. After all, if The Holiday taught us anything, it’s that you’d be wise to go down Meyers’s Hollywood classic rabbit hole: Remember Arthur Abbot? He was the equal parts adorable and intuitive elderly neighbor that prescribed Kate Winslet’s Iris a list of movies with strong female characters with gumption, to help her become “the leading lady of her own life.” Just let the good old-fashioned cinema consume you, okay?
Last night, Meyers—looking nothing short of Diane Keaton as Erica Barry from Something’s Gotta Give, wearing brown-framed glasses, a chunky turtleneck, and a sandy-gray bob in front of sprawling bookshelves—spoke with Katie Couric on Instagram Live and divulged her list of “great-to-escape-into” film favorites. “I really love comedy,” says Meyers. “It’s been keeping me sane through this.”
From Billy Wilder’s iconic The Apartment to The Birdcage, let these cultish feel-good films bring some much-needed comic relief.
“It’s a hilarious movie from beginning to end,” says Meyers, preaching the gospel of Mike Nichols’s 1996 comedy, which stars the late Robin Williams and Nathan Lane as a tender, flamboyant couple presiding over a drag club in Miami’s South Beach. Christine Baranski plays the biological mom of of Williams’s son and, at one point, the two share a song-and-dance scene. Need more be said?
