Jun 19, 2020

"The Perfect Wedding.": Much Ado Over a Kiss

A Perfect Wedding, on Amazon Prime, is a "light romantic comedy about two men who..."

That's as far as the blurb will go.  Do I dare imagine that the two guys are planning their own wedding?  Or will they be competing over the a girl in a heterosexual farce?

Ok, here we go.

Prologue:  Establishing shot of an ornate Florida mansion with incongruous kitsch like garden gnomes and pink flamingoes The hunky Paul (Rico Aragon), who apparently collects kitsch, wakes up to the Chipmunks (the 1960s novelty group) singing "We wish you a merry Christmas."   Nice chest.

Paul goes downstairs to an older guy (James Rebhorn) at the breakfast table.  The boyfriend? No-- "Hi, Dad."  He grabs a Christmas present and leaves.

A hunky older guy, Zack (Sal Rendino), picks him up. The boyfriend?  No, apparently his sponsor at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.  Paul is 18 months sober!

Scene 1:  A middle-class house with a Mom and Dad puttering aorund doing old-person stuff.  Wait -- this is Paul's house from the prologue, just much less ornate, that's Paul's Dad, much older! Why the complete change  in setting and character?

Daughter Alana and Vickie arrive.  Hugs all around. Girlfriends?  Is the perfect wedding theirs?

Scene 2:  Cut to an American Sign Language class, where the rather feminine  Gavin (Jason T. Gaffney, left).  is the instructor and Roy (Roger Stewart) one of the students.  Ok, maybe they're the boyfriends?

Scene 3: Alana and Vickie, unpacking, discuss Roy.  He is Alana's best friend,but still,should he come to the wedding? Her brother Paul the Kitsch Collector will be there.

Scene 4:  Gavin the ASL Teacher and Roy load up the car and drive to Christmas/wedding at Alana's house.  On the way. Roy gives Gavin a plot dump:

Roy and Paul the Kitsch Collector were together until he caught Paul cheating and showed him the door.  Then Roy started dating Gavin the ASL Teacher.

Confused?  You won'tbe after today's episode of Soap.

Scene 5: Paul the Kitsch Collector and Sponsor Zack, also his coworker, are hard at work at a plant nursery.  See, Paul has reformed. He is no longer a jerk.  And he wants to fix up Zack with his sister's friend Vickie.  (Is this a Shakespearean comedy, where everyone gets paired off?)

Meanwhile, in the car,  Roy finishes the plot dump; "As you know, Gavin, we have broken up, but we're going to pretend that we are still together to stick it to Paul the Jerk."

Scene 6:  The house is an ornate mansion again, and Alana and Vickie are making Christmas cookies. They start discussing two new characters, Kirk and Merrill, but before another plot dump, Gavin the ASL Teacher and Roy the Ex arrive.

After small talk, Paul the Kitsch Collector arrives.  Hugs all around. Did I just see Gavin giving him a cruisy look.  When he finds out that Gavin is an ASL interpreter,he tries a little signing ("I am a goat."}

They play charades.  We literally watch them playing charades for five minutes of screen time.

Scene 7:  Paul gets Roy the Ex alone to apologize for being such a jerk (that's one of the steps of Alcoholics Anonymous, isn't it/).  Gavin eavesdrops.

Later, Gavin tries to talk Roy into getting back together with Paul (um...he's your fake boyfriend, remember?)

Gavin is sleeping on the floor, ,so when Alanna drops by, they have to scramble to jump in bed together.  Come on, I've shared beds with countless friends, including ex-lovers.

Alanna brings in mistletoe and insists on seeing a big, sloppin Christmas smooch from the obviously uncomfortable pair.  Not approp, girlfirend!

Scene 8: Paul and Gavin the ASL Interpreter have a heart-to-heart about Paul's horrible childhood (in a house that keeps morphing into a mansion?) and the car accident that caused him to get sober.  Gavin  discusses his hearing impairment.

Then some wedding planning and Christmas tree stuff.

Paul gushes over the book Gavin wrote (all 588 pages of it).  Here's a line:

"Fear not your destiny, for you have shaped it well."

Yeah, Paul is just being nice. Or cruising.




Scene 9: Gavin and Alanna bond.  Takeaway: Alanna doesn't want a big wedding,but her parents have their hearts set on one.

Zack (Paul's sponsor from Scene 5) arrives, and he brought Kirk (Brendan Griffin), the groom. They all have lunch (the house is a mansion again). Kirk tells Paul that doesn't want a huge wedding, either.  But...the parents...hearts set?

I didn't think it was important to mention,but Dad has been forgetting things and acting weird.  Turns out he has Alzheimer's.  So they have to have a big wedding to make him happy before he forgets everything.

Scene 10:  They're playing another game. We watch for five minutes of screen time.  Geez, turn on a tv set once in awhile.  Paul's a kitsch collector -- maybe there's a cheesy Christmas special on.

Scene 11:  Kirk and Alanna discuss a scheme to have a small, intimate wedding instead of the three-ring circus Mom and Dad want.  Their wedding song will be "Amazing Grace."  (Seriously? Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me?)

Scene 12: All of the younger guests are in on the scheme: it will happen tonight, so Mom and Dad don't get a chance to put a kibosh on it!  Paul and Gavin rush over to the nursery to get flowers and flirt.  Come on, Gavin -- the deception is just to torture Paul, who is no longer a jerk.  Tell him the truth already, so you can date.


Scene 13:  Mom and Dad find out about the small wedding..  They're ok with it.  So...um..where's the conflict?

Scene 14: The wedding.  Well, that was easy.

Scene 15:  The reception.  Zack the Sponsor flirts with Vickie (Alanna's best friend,remember?  She's staying at the house, but she's been absent since Roy arrived in Scene 6.  Why was she even in the cast?)

Scene 16:  Late that night, Gavin sneaks downstairs to learn to play the weird Dungeons and Dragons-type game he is giving his "boyfriend" Roy for Christmas.  Another game?  If they are actually shown playing it, I'm leaving. 

Paul comes downstairs to help (right, I forgot that he lives in the Incredible Morphing House)

Scene 17:  Christmas morning, but no one is even thinking about presents.

Paul talks to Sponsor Zack.  He's overcome with guilt over kissing Gavin, Roy's "boyfriend," last night.  It's all starting up again!  He's an inconsiderate jerk!  (Knowing his guilt over cheating in the past, why wouldn't Gavin just tell him about the deception?)

Surprise!  Gavin packed up and left last night! (So now Roy doesn't have a ride back to whatever town they live in?)  He left a note saying he's going to catch a plane to California.

Why does he feel bad?  He wasn't cheating.

Paul tells the whole family about the kiss.  They are all shocked and horrified.  Finally -- finally -- Roy tells them about the deception.  What a jerk, torturing Paul for so long!  Oddly, no one is angry, not even Paul.

Scene 18: I thought there'd be a rushing-through-the-airport scene, but Paul just shows up at Gavin's apartment for the fade-out kiss.  And wedding (a big one).

Beefcake:  Paul and Gavin are shirtless several times.


Gay Characters:Yes.

Amazing Morphing Houses: Mansion in one scene, middle-class drab in another.

Overstuffed Plot:  Yes. Poor Vickie was forgotten about.  The conflict over big-small weddings faded out. Paul's kitsch interest -- forgotten.  Dad has Alzheimer's -- what's that about?  And who are Tessa, Brad, and Louis?

And: we spent the whole prologue being reminded about that Christmas present, over and over.  Then it was never given to anyone, or mentioned, ever again.

Unrealistic Character Motives:  Keeping up the deception for so long.  Actually, I thought they came clean during the game-playing scenes that I fast-forwarded through. Or forgot about it.

My Grade: B.  At least there are gay characters.

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