Closing Night: Thelma
Description
A steely and hysterical June Squibb sinks her teeth into her first leading role as a 93-year-old widow proudly living alone who falls prey to a cash-grabbing hoax. Vowing to bring the perpetrators to justice, Thelma sets out on an odyssey across an evocatively lensed Los Angeles landscape, accompanied by her old friend Ben (a scene-stealing Richard Roundtree in his final performance). Together, the determined duo wield their charm, social invisibility, and elder-age devices to overcome numerous obstacles. Director Josh Margolin overtly and subtly draws on action-hero genre cliches, playing with traditional set-ups to illustrate Thelma’s agency while also placing Tom Cruise and Mission: Impossible directly into the plot. Margolin is firmly at the helm of this hilarious romp but the film belongs to Squibb, as the Oscar®-nominated performer imbues Thelma with a hunger to be seen and understood by those who love her most, something we never grow out of.
Biographies
Josh Margolin received a BA in theater from Wesleyan University. He is an actor and improv comic, who was part of One Night Stand: An Improvised Musical, as well as a director and screenwriter. He created, wrote, and starred in My Boyfriend Is a Robot (2017) and co-wrote and starred in Deep Murder (2019). He made his directorial debut with a short film, A Dentist (2011). Thelma is his first feature.
