Never ask a question that you’re not prepared to receive the answer. In particular in matters of love, never inquire of your significant other something that you may not want to hear. It’s like asking, “How many sexual partners have you been with?” There is no good answer, so just don’t even ask it. Kristofer Borgli’s The Drama is driven by this very issue, and a deep, dark secret that drives a wedge between a soon-to-be-wedded couple played by Robert Pattinson and Zendaya. It’s a deeply uncomfortable film, good for some nervous laughter, and is a movie that is sure to spark intense conversations. Some of it will be for good, but some will also be for the razor-thin portrayals and the dismissive approach to a tragic issue that has already sparked its share of controversy.
Ostensibly a rom-com, The Drama opens with a meet-cute seen from Charlie’s (Pattinson) perspective. The British museum curator is unfathomably shy and, as we see throughout, woefully passive-aggressive. He spots Emma (Zendaya) in a posh little coffee shop as she’s reading a book. When she steps away for a moment, he rushes over and snaps a photo so he can look up the book and pretend to have read it. He attempts to speak to her, only to be ignored because he’s speaking into her deaf ear. Despite this awkward first encounter, Emma is somehow smitten and willing to give him a chance, which leads to a first date. Awwww shucks. Not a bad story, especially as Charlie is trying to convince his pal Mike (Mamoudou Athie) that it’ll be good to tell as part of the wedding speech.
A major problem with The Drama is that we are never presented with any other reason for Charlie and Emma to be together. They are blank slates, and while that’s not too big of a deal for Charlie who is just kinda sleazy and weak, it severely hinders our view of Emma, whose life is racked by complications. For one thing, she admits to never having been in love until well into her 20s. So how can she know if what she has with Charlie is real? This question is posed matter-of-factly by her best friend Rachel (Alana Haim, playing the closest thing to a villain), and Emma has no answer.
Distributor A24 has gone out of its way to keep the plot’s key secret hidden, and I won’t spoil it here. But it involves a silly game where everyone is forced to admit the worst thing they’ve ever done. Mike has a rather pathetic story involving a dog and his ex-girlfriend; Rachel locked a slow-witted neighbor kid in a closet and left him there; and Charlie bullshitted around before admitting that he might’ve cyber-bullied someone. But Emma…well, her admission is so disturbing that it freaks everyone out. She was a teenager, and one bullied for no apparent reason other than her race.
Borgli doesn’t seem particularly interested in exploring the factors that nearly led Emma to commit a heinous act. The racial component is key. Emma is of mixed race, but perceptions of Black people as violent are prevalent. It’s no coincidence that as soon as Emma makes her admission, suddenly Charlie is terrified of her, and Rachel hates the very ground she walks on. This when, if you really break it down, some of the other admissions were way worse than Emma’s. So why the harsh judgment solely for her? Borgli has no answer and doesn’t even bother to try.
Where The Drama succeeds is in how Borgli mines humor from this ridiculously tense situation. Weddings are stressful enough, but as the day approaches, it becomes clear to everyone that this can’t go on, but Emma and Charlie are either too stubborn or too blind to see it. Charlie, a buttoned-up Brit, becomes a frazzled dufus who suddenly can’t even smile for the wedding photos or get it up during sex. Things get even worse when he asks his sexy co-worker (Hailey Gates, superb in a small role) the same dreaded question that caused this madness. Don’t they say that insanity is repeating the same thing and expecting a different result? Let’s just say, the high stress level throughout will remind you of films by Ari Aster, who just so happens to be a producer. When the wedding day arrives, it’s an understatement that the speeches are like a single car crash that grows into a 20-car pileup.
Zendaya continues to challenge herself with candid, risqué roles, with The Drama allowing her to show vulnerability we haven’t seen outside of Euphoria. And Pattinson, who isn’t someone I necessarily think of as funny, portrays Charlie’s descent into madness with flair and impressive physical comedy. Zendaya and Pattinson have incredible chemistry and keep this film together, and it’ll be interesting to see how much screen time they share in Dune: Part Three. I wasn’t the biggest fan of Borgli’s most recent film, the surreal celebrity nightmare comedy Dream Scenario, as it suffered from the same shallowness that hinders The Drama. In both cases, being surface-level didn’t detract from their entertainment value, or keep them from becoming fiery conversation pieces. I suspect that there will be some highly-charged chatter between couples on the ride home from The Drama.
The Drama opens in theaters on April 3rd.
