Midler, naturally, is afforded the lion’s share of the best outfits, especially the scene in which creepy businessman Fabio takes her out and she wears a marvellous gown, incidentally foreshadowing her stint in Hello Dolly decades later. The costumes are stupendous, capturing the essence of brash, audacious 80s power-dressing – gargantuan shoulders, asymmetric hair – with outfits usually reserved for a Drag Race hillbilly acting challenge. One watch and you will never pass the bathroom mirror the same again. What emerges is nothing short of performance art: Bette Midler, in a white polka dot power suit, is confronted with her twin but assumes she is looking at her reflection, and shimmies to check what she is seeing. The most iconic moment, of course, is the reveal, when each set of twins discovers the other in the ladies’ room.
But there are moments of glory throughout, when the labyrinthine plot unravels and chaos ensues. As cheesy 80s comedies go, it delivers laughs, but I wonder if this is thanks to the succinct comic timing of the film’s leads and their ability to elevate a so-so script. Confused? Just roll with it and bask in the glory of Midler and Tomlin delivering excellently stupid performances in what is an ultimately stupid film. When the treacherous Sadie decides to liquidate her company’s furniture factory in Jupiter Hollow, Sadie and Rose Ratliff – the hicks – come to New York to confront her at the stockholders’ meeting, unaware they are meeting their identical twins.
The ‘business’ portion of the film, and indeed the closest thing we have to a plot other than the twin switch, is that the Shelton sisters (the city slickers) are co-chairwomen of a huge conglomerate in New York City. This terrible confusion occurs in a backwoods town called Jupiter Hollow, and thus we are presented with Midler and Tomlin as two pairs of twins, Sadie and Rose, who each grow up with the wrong sister.
BIG BUSINESS 1988 FILM MOVIE
Just when we were worried our discerning collection of movies was becoming too highbrow and, as one of our particular characters would say, highfalutin, it felt right to welcome Big Business into The (not) Gay Movie Club.Ĭan you believe that two sets of identical twins could have the misfortune of being born and mixed up by the same inebriated nurse in the same hospital? Some people have no luck. Lily Tomlin, meanwhile, has enjoyed a great resurgence because of Grace and Frankie, but has been a trailblazing comic actor and activist for nearly 60 years.īig Business currently enjoys three stars on iMDB, which is frankly quite surprising – we expected it to be lower. She is bawdy, her talent is immense, and every role she plays – even her offscreen persona – exudes unflappable confidence and joy. Bette Midler, the Divine Miss M, is one of pop culture’s most enduring gay icons. My appreciation of this 1988 farce is relatively new, but its stars are quintessential Hollywood juggernauts, with whom I am very familiar. And there are few examples as convoluted, camp and kitsch as Big Business.
From Twins to the various incarnations of The Parent Trap, twins and their hilarious escapades have never failed to inspire Hollywood filmmakers.
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