“Parents groups need to calm down a bit”: ‘No Hard Feelings’ Being Slammed for Showing Parents Hiring Jennifer Lawrence to Date Their Son
No Hard Feelings, a recent release from Sony featuring actors Andrew Barth Feldman and Jennifer Lawrence, is thought to be an R-rated comedy with a raunchy reality. Even though the movie’s concept appears to be very intriguing and has managed to impress a large section of the audience and the critics, some viewers did not share their enthusiasm and described it as “creepy”.
The lead character in the Gene Stupnitsky-directed film, Maddie Barker, is an Uber driver in her early 30s who is on the verge of going bankrupt. Maddie searches Craiglist for an odd job where a wealthy couple is looking for someone to date their socially awkward 19-year-old son Percy for the summer before he leaves for college. The proposal also stated that the wealthy couple would be providing a Buick Regal as compensation.
No Hard Feelings’ concept is based on a real ad from a decade ago
No Hard Feelings starring Jennifer Lawrence and Andrew Barth Feldman comes out with a unique concept of parents hiring someone to date their socially awkward son so that he gets out of his shell before he is off to college.
Director Gene Stupnitsky recently revealed in an interview with EW at CinemaCon that the producers, Marc Provissiero and Naomi Odenkirk came up to him with an ad they saw on Craiglist which was, about a couple looking for a woman to date their son.
Stupnistky said, “I read it, and I thought, ‘This is wild. Who is the woman that answers this ad?’And I thought, ‘Oh, that’ll be a great role for my friend Jennifer Lawrence.’” He later revealed in another interview that he specifically created the character of Maddie Barker for Lawrence because of her comic style. However, Provissiero clarified that Stupnitsky did not try to look into who posted the ad but just made it his script.
He added, “I remember I told her, ‘I really want you to experience the feeling of sitting in a theatre with hundreds of people laughing.’ She’s had many, many experiences films, but she hasn’t, quite had this one.” As for the actress who revealed that she has always been a fan of comedy movies and wanted to do one but she never read any script that was funny enough. She added, “I thought it was hilarious, but there wasn’t a script or anything. I just thought he had a funny idea. And then, a couple years later, he handed me the funniest script I’ve ever read in my life.”
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Fans react to the No Hard Feelings
Even though the root of the movie was based on reality, the fictionalized version did not impress a section of the audience and they took to their social media to share their opinions and call the movie’s premise ‘creepy’, but some of them have come in defense of the idea.
I roll my eyes when filmmakers say its hard to make comedy now bc people are offended by everything but after #NoHardFeelings maybe they are right. https://t.co/kym4oLyzg2
— Yaw➕ (@Yaw_Nokturnal) June 25, 2023
it’s… a movie https://t.co/qQek5bqmgm
— bethany (@fiImgal) June 25, 2023
Modern audiences are so freaking boring. You guys need to stop acting like everything is out to get you. Society has always had an issue with media being “risky,” but it’s especially a problem now when people takes things quite literally. It’s satire, let movies be movies. https://t.co/V0UHAx0GCc
— Edgar Ortega (@edgorteg) June 25, 2023
Parents groups or whoever pushes this kind of moral panic need to calm down a bit lol.
It's a setup that leads into a great character journey for someone coming out of their shell!#NoHardFeelings pic.twitter.com/jRejVsGonS
— Drü 🜃 (@drewexmachina) June 25, 2023
A user on Twitter said,” It’s hilarious that the children are mad about a movie making fun of what prudish little weirdos they are.” Whereas another user mentioned, “Modern audiences are so freaking boring. You guys need to stop acting like everything is out to get you. Society has always had an issue with the media being “risky,” but it’s especially a problem now when people take things quite literally. It’s satire, let movies be movies.”
Actors defend the backlash for No Hard Feelings
Laura Benanti and Matthew Broderick, who play the parents in the movie, both agree that what the parents are asking a stranger to do is insane but, at the same time, mention that the movie is satirizing helicopter parenting parents. Benanti said to THR,
“It’s a cautionary tale. If you are a helicopter parent who puts your child in such a bubble, they do not know how to exist outside of that bubble, you are going to make the exact opposite and insane choice, which is what they are doing here. I feel like it is a very satirical look at what can happen if you do not give your children a longer leash to figure things out for themselves. Otherwise, you’re going to end up curating their life forever.”
When asked about the controversy surrounding the movie, Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group President Sanford Panitch said that it’s just a really funny movie. Broderick also added that it was just really fun to read, as silly as it sounds, adding that it was just a pleasure.
Source: THR
