Eschewing his usual schtick of portraying unlikeable characters, Parks & Recreation‘s Nick Kroll is making a change for the better in Adult Beginners. The festival darling hails from director Ross Katz and stars Kroll as troubled New Yorker Jake. After a professional mishap, Jake returns to his childhood abode to crash with his sister Justine (Rose Byrne) and her husband Danny (Bobby Cannavale). A part of their agreement finds the unemployed Jake lumbered with taking care of the couple’s three-year old son.
On the basis of its bare-bones story, Adult Beginners sounds like the majority of adult-aimed comedies. A smattering of high brow sarcasm combined with a few slapstick scenes wrapped together with a convenient moral bow. Delve a little deeper into this trailer though, and the proof may be in the pudding.
While Byrne and Cannavale bring their usual A-game mix of comedy, it’s Kroll who elevates the preview into an appealing riff on adult sibling dynamics. Head on over to Entertainment Weekly’s site to check out the trailer.
Adult Beginners made its worldwide debut at last year’s TIFF and will screen at SXSW next week ahead of its April 24 release.
Adult Beginners begins with one yuppie’s disaster. On the eve of the product launch designed to shoot his career into the stratosphere, Jake (Nick Kroll) discovers that, because of a single misstep, his life has plummeted into the dirt. Having lost his girlfriend, his credibility, and over $2.5 million in investor money, Jake retreats to the one place where he’s always welcome: his childhood home, which is now occupied by his pregnant sister Justine (Rose Byrne, also appearing at the Festival in This is Where I Leave You), her husband Danny (Bobby Cannavale), and their three-year-old son, Teddy. Justine and Danny agree that Jake can stay as long as he wants — so long as he agrees to look after Teddy on the weekdays. Used to a high-rollin’ big-city lifestyle, and knowing zilch about childcare, Jake can’t wait for his spell in suburban purgatory to end. But with a little time and a lot of humility, he may just develop a new idea about where he really belongs.
