We saw it when Ridley Scott blamed millennials for The Last Duel not doing too hot at the box office, and we saw it when Denis Villeneuve pushed for Dune viewers to watch the sci-fi spectacle in theaters because watching at home was “ridiculous.” Directors have had it up to here with unresponsive audiences. So, who’s the latest star to join the choir of filmmakers asking for better-behaved movie watchers? Why it’s none other than The West Wing’s Aaron Sorkin.
In an interview with Variety, the film director and playwright said there are three things he wants audiences to walk away with after watching Being the Ricardos, his upcoming biopic spotlighting the off-screen relationships between Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. While simply having a “good time” topped the list, Sorkin said he also hopes people leave the theater with less of a connection with social media.
“Mostly, I want them to have a good time during the two hours that were asked for their attention, realize that the lives of Lucy and Desi were considerably more complicated than Lucy and Ricky, and pay less attention to Twitter,” Sorkin said.
However, while Sorkin’s words might sound a bit crochety at first, it turns out the director actually had quite a lot more to say about social media and did raise some great points about how reactive and divisive it can be, drawing a comparison to it and society’s fear of Communism in the early 1950s. Sorkin said he hopes watchers will be able to spot some parallels between what Lucy undergoes in the film and what happens to folks “that fall out of favor with Twitter.”
“I hope the way they’ll react is that they’ll see some similarities between what’s happening to Lucy and what happens to a number of people that fall out of favor with Twitter,” Sorkin said. “It just seems like when you walk into social media that you’re walking into a big room with mean graffiti all over the walls.”
Set during the 1950s, Being the Ricardos takes place over the course of one production week on the set of I Love Lucy and follows Lucy and Desi as they confront rumors that could jeopardize both their marriage and careers, and according to the press release, that’s merely the beginning:
Lucille Ball (Nicole Kidman) and Desi Arnaz (Javier Bardem) are threatened by shocking personal accusations, a political smear, and cultural taboos in Academy Award-winning writer and director Aaron Sorkin’s behind-the-scenes drama Being the Ricardos. A revealing glimpse of the couple’s complex romantic and professional relationship, the film takes audiences into the writers’ room, onto the soundstage, and behind closed doors with Ball and Arnaz during one critical production week of their groundbreaking sitcom I Love Lucy.
Being the Ricardos opens in select theaters on December 10 and will be available to watch via Amazon Prime Video starting December 21.