Film Recommendation: ‘Role of a Lifetime’ is Unintentionally Hilarious

Role of a Lifetime. Written and directed by Antony Alda. Produced by PorchLight Entertainment. Copyright 2002. (Seen September 16, 2024.)

A few months ago, Jen Rossman was doing a live-tweet re-watch of Quantum Leap (1989 version). They are hilarious in their observations, and it was so much fun following their reactions. As they went through the series, I couldn’t help but have a hankering to re-watch the series as well.

I had fallen in love with the show when it was on, and then in 2000 I got back into the show in a major way. (If you’re interested, I am doing a re-watch and writing up my off-the-cuff/stream of consciousness thoughts as I watch them over on my Dreamwidth account.)

It also made me remember how good of an actor both Scott Bakula and Dean Stockwell were (and are, in the case of Bakula). A friend of mine, who has also fallen back into the Quantum Leap (and actors) fandom, suggested Role of a Lifetime, a movie staring Bakula I hadn’t heard about before. I looked over the plot, and when I saw it was uploaded on YouTube, I decided to give it a watch – figuring it couldn’t be too bad.

I don’t know whether to curse her or thank her.

The plot, such as it is, follows Hollywood actor Bobby Cellini (Bakula in a very disturbing Tom Selleck-esque mustache), who was once a name and has fallen into the area of “Sorry, I thought you were whoozis. What ever happened to her?” (“I’m Still Here”, by Stephen Sondheim.) He’s a major jerk: drinks too much, so focused on his career that he doesn’t pay attention to anyone (or anything) outside of himself, and feels Hollywood ‘owes’ him another shot.

In a fit of pique, he takes a drive – and crashes his car into what looks to be Runyan Canyon. He wakes up to find out he’s been ‘missing’ for six weeks, presumed dead by Hollywood. When he hears that there’s plans to make a movie based on his life, he comes up with the … unusual plan to have Cellini stay ‘dead’ and reinvent himself as another actor (the hilariously named Buck Steele) with the goal of auditioning for the role of Cellini himself.

Hilarity ensues: some of it, I think, unintentional.

Bakula is excellent as always as both Cellini and Steele (the ‘Southern’ accent he uses as Steele is hilariously stereotypical). He switches from jerk Cellini to sweet Steele easily: there’s no question which part he’s doing. And when Cellini starts discovering that most people don’t care for him (and in some cases are actually kind of glad he’s ‘dead’), Bakula does a great job of showing the transition to understanding in a gradual enough way to where you can believe it.

He’s supported by several actors: most notably Kathryn Morris as Chelsea, Cellini’s ex-wife (who of course is also directing the movie in question); Harry Groener as Brad Collings, Cellini’s agent; and writer/director Antony Alda as Cellini’s roommate Joey.

First, the bad: The audio is not consistent – it goes from loud to soft within the same scene. The quality definitely shows that it was filmed on a budget. And the idea that an actor would be declared ‘dead’ after only six weeks is stretching reality, not to mention the ease in which ‘Steele’ gets cast and noticed by Hollywood execs.

The good: you get to see Bakula shirtless at one point (I’m starting to think it was in his regular contract to be shirtless, in jeans, or both <g>). Because the plot takes place in Los Angeles/Hollywood, they don’t hide the filming locations. As someone who lives in Los Angeles, it’s funny to be able to recognize locations. And you can see that everyone, especially Bakula, is having a field day sending up the industry. The 90-minute (ish) run-time is perfect: any longer and the joke would’ve gotten old, and any shorter and it would’ve felt rushed.

Finally, I’m not sure if this is good or bad: I could not stop laughing during it. From Bakula’s overacting at times (as well as Groener’s take on agents), to the jokes about Hollywood, to the second-hand embarrassment of Cellini (as Steele) being told how awful Cellini was, the movie is almost a laugh a minute. Whether or not that’s intentional, though, I’m not sure. (After all, IMDB marks it as a drama, while the YouTube description says comedy.)

I immediately recommended this to anyone and everyone I thought would appreciate it, and it shot to the top of my favorite films of Bakula’s. It made me remember why I liked him so much.

If you’re looking for a good comedy about Hollywood and have the time, I highly recommend sitting down and checking it out.