Art is difficult; artists can be more difficult.
Anyone who’s ever tried to write a play, a poem, a short story or novel, anyone who’s ever tried to compose a song, paint a picture, or deliver an emotional monologue knows the following to be true: art is hard.
And anyone who’s ever read Jean Paul Sartre’s No Exit, or really anyone who’s ever had a family, friends, or co-workers, knows this to be true: Hell is other people.
Both these unfortunate tenets are at the heart of today’s short film selection, a droll comedy from writer-director-star Jon Mishner entitled Opening Night, that sets as it’s situation the debut performance of a play about “a mouse imposter who commits cheese fraud.” Honestly, Mishner had me there. But where he takes this context is somewhere wholly unexpected, completely believable, and entirely hilarious.
Mishner himself is the mouse imposter/play author, so the comedic burden falls on his furry shoulders, and he carries it like a rodent scurrying away with pilfered cheese: proudly, adeptly, and with a trace of mischief. His supporting cast – both literally and meta-literally – is the architecture of funny erected on the foundation Mishner establishes, and taken all together the result is a smart, silly, slightly absurd, and highly-enjoyable quarter-hour.
And if Mishner’s brand of funny does it for you – which it should – then you have to jump over to his YouTube channel for tons of others shorts and skits. Start here, move there, laugh the whole way.
Related Topics: Short Films
