During the Q & A following the premiere of “Maddie’s Secret,” John Early admitted the idea for a story came primarily from a desire to play an ingenue, stepping into the shoes of the kind of roles Lana Turner might play in the 1950s where beauty belied some darker truth buried underneath the glamour. Knowing Early’s stage act with memorably self-assured characters such as the impulsive Southern-fried mother-in-law Vicky, it comes as no surprise that he quite credibly steps into the luscious blonde locks of Maddie, an aspiring food blogger, with disarming sincerity. However, it’s how Early takes on the role of auteur just as confidently that could leave the biggest impression, demanding that the camera keep up with the energy he brings as a woman of great ambition in the culinary world built on crippling insecurities about her eating habits in his deliciously irreverent directorial debut.
Naturally, “Maddie’s Secret” hits the ground running, trailing Maddie jogging through the streets of Los Angeles, breezing by the street juggler in the middle of an intersection that would catch the eye of most, but instead stopped dead in her tracks by a poster of an eggplant. The sight gag could infer some sexual attraction, but Early often turns an obvious joke into something even a little more perverse in the long run and it’s revealed to be the spark for Maddie to imagine a smash burger that’s “a little Mexican, a little Filipino, and a little, well, me.” The demure delivery of this line to his co-worker Deena (Kate Berlant) is bound to inspire howls as a bit of a humblebrag, but it can also be read as a tendency to diminish herself as part of something larger, which is something Maddie does a lot, not easily accepting the viral success of the video of the eggplant smash burger that’s her husband (Eric Rahill) makes and throws online or her boss at the content kitchen Gourmaybe’s (Connor O’Malley) demand that she make the video an official part of the brand she currently toils for as a dishwasher, much to the chagrin of the channel’s primary host Emily (Claudia O’Doherty). The first hint that something might be amiss comes when a call to her mother Beverlee (Kristen Johnston) isn’t greeted with a congratulations, but a reminder of the eating disorder that plagued her as a kid and suddenly it seems like cooking isn’t exactly a passion for Maddie, but a means of gaining control over a debilitating condition.
Early cited stylistic references ranging from Douglas Sirk melodramas to the Amy Jo Johnson afterschool special “The Perfect Body” as inspiration for “Maddie’s Secret,” and it’s an appropriately queasy mix for the kind of uncomfortable comedy that Early is so gifted at as a performer. Although the film is replete with the influence of both visually and in the style of acting in playing to the rafters, it is in some ways split in two along those lines narratively when the first half tracks Maddie’s rapid rise in a world full of lush color and frenetic movement – even beyond the dance classes Dina gets him to join, the camera is constantly bouncing between characters – and a second set in a blandly beige psychiatric ward where Maddie is sent to deal with her issues stemming from the bulimia she first developed in her youth.
As mercilessly funny as the film is throughout, the one role Early doesn’t entirely pull off is as the architect of the story when it feels as if dealing with serious subject matter might’ve become slightly overwhelming to pay off in a satisfying yet respectful way. The energy slightly starts to flag as a confrontation with Maddie’s mother seems inevitable and moving so drastically away from the workplace the film starts out so strong in can’t help but feel like a comedown, though fellow patients of Maddie’s played by Vanessa Bayer and Ruby McCollister, among others, all are well worth spending time with.
However, Early does something special with Maddie, clearly a comic creation that engenders genuine empathy and never played as a punchline, and as much as the character herself never feels false, the actor/director builds an world around her that feels authentic as well in spite of how outrageous it is, with both the pressures facing her in a cutthroat industry of content creation and the presence of support that she can’t see for herself particularly striking in their emotional detail. (As much as the film is a marvelous showcase for Early, his longtime partner-in-crime Berlant really gets to stretch her muscles here as Maddie’s bestie.) Though the heart of it sneaks up on you, nothing stays hidden for too long in “Maddie’s Secret,” including the fact that Early seems simply born to be a star.
“Maddie’s Secret” will screen again at the Toronto Film Festival at the Scotiabank on September 14th at 6:30 pm.