Michael McKean Movies

In this comedy, two women head for Reno to get simultaneous quicky divorces and end up becoming friends. Edie was married years ago, but her husband abandoned her two weeks after the wedding. Pen spent nine years married to an ice-cold businessman who neglected her. Edie and Pen meet while leaving the courtroom. They immediately head for a bar where they encounter Harry, who is despondent that his wife took his beloved dog when she left him. As the three grow increasingly inebriated, they begin having long conversations about their pasts, presents and futures. Now that ditzy Edie is divorced, she plans to marry her new love in Acapulco. Meanwhile, womanizing Harry attempts to bed the vulnerable Pen. Dramatic tension rises when Pen discovers that Edie's fiancé is her ex-husband. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Enraged when a jury acquits the obviously guilty man who murdered her brother, a young woman abducts the attorney responsible for his freedom. Made especially for the Lifetime cable network, this drama follows what happens when the woman herself is caught and sent to trial. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Mockumentary mastermind Christopher Guest turns his satirical eye away from dog shows, small-town theater, and folk music to offer a hilarious take on Hollywood award season in this comedy focusing on trio of actors whose lives are turned upside down when they discover that their performances in an independent film are generating a sizable buzz in the entertainment industry. Jay Berman (Guest) is in the process of directing his first feature film -- an intimate family drama set in the 1940s and detailing the tempestuous reunion of an estranged Jewish family that is reluctantly drawn together to celebrate Purim at the behest of their dying matriarch. The cast soon comes down with an infectious case of award fever when rumors on the Internet claim that "Purim" stars Marilyn Hack (Catherine O' Hara), Victor Allan Miller (Harry Shearer), and Callie Webb (Parker Posey) may be delivering Oscar-caliber performances. When "Hollywood Now" co-anchors Chuck Porter (Fred Willard) and Cindy Martin (Jane Lynch) perpetuate the buzz on national television, the entire film crew starts to see stars in their eyes. Subsequently convinced that they have a sleeper hit on their hands, unit publicist Corey Taft (John Michael Higgins), talent agent Morley Orfkin (Eugene Levy), and producer Whitney Taylor Brown (Jennifer Coolidge) immediately cave to requests from Sunfish Classics president Martin Gibb (Ricky Gervais) to alter the film so that it may appeal to a larger audience. Now, while "Purim" screenwriters Lane Iverson (Michael McKean) and Philip Koontz (Bob Balaban) are forced to watch helplessly as their original screenplay is plundered in order to cash in on the positive buzz, awards season draws near and the production takes a most unexpected turn. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

John Flansburgh and John Linnell are a pair of musicians who met when they were fellow junior-high misfits in the town of Lincoln, MA. Sharing a fondness for off-center pop music and absurdist humor, the pair decided to form a band, and later moved to Brooklyn, NY, in search of their big break. Adopting a rather unusual two-man lineup (guitar and accordion accompanied by a drum machine), the duo began performing as They Might Be Giants, and their shows were part concert, part performance art, and part edgy comedy. Slowly but surely, They Might Be Giants became one of the biggest bands on the alternative rock scene, and while they never threatened to break into the upper reaches of the Billboard charts, they've managed to develop a loyal cult following, and after nearly 20 years together, are still recording and performing their one-of-a-kind songs on their own terms. Gigantic (A Tale of Two Johns) is a documentary which looks at the long and sometimes strange history of They Might Be Giants, featuring extensive interviews with Flansburgh and Linnell; thoughts from fellow musicians Frank Black and Syd Straw; endorsements from noted authors Dave Eggers, Gina Arnold, and Michael Azerrad; and readings of the group's lyrics from actors (and fans) Harry Shearer, Janeane Garofalo, Michael McKean, and Annette O'Toole. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

A sequel to Martin Mull's spoof about the hardships of white life in middle America. ~ All Movie Guide

In this film by director Francis Ford Coppola, Robin Williams stars as Jack, a boy who is growing normally, but at many times the normal rate. In a bizarre flashback, we see that he was born when his mother was only ten weeks pregnant. Kept out of school for years, the neighborhood children consider him a freak, and generally avoid him. He is finally required to go to public school, and we catch up to him as he enters the fourth grade for the first time, a 10-year-old boy who appears to be a fully grown man in his 40s. His classmates tease him mercilessly until they begin to see the advantages of having him around. He must also have some grown-up feelings to go along with his grown-up body, because he asks his teacher out for a date. When she refuses him, he goes off into town and gets into adult-type trouble as he courts nightclub denizen Dolores Durante (Fran Drescher) over the objections of her boyfriend. Teacher Lawrence Woodruff (Bill Cosby) tries (with some success) to help Jack cope with his situation. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Penny Marshall in her feature film directing debut, four screenwriters, and a ebullient Whoopi Goldberg join forces to make Jumpin' Jack Flash, a modern espionage comedy. Goldberg plays Terry Doolittle, a computer operator in a large New York City bank who picks up a cry of help on her computer. The signal is from a man who signs off as Jumpin' Jack Flash. Based on the Rolling Stones tune of that name, she figures out his secret password and opens up a Pandora's box of international intrigue. It seems Jack Flash is a pseudonym for a British agent who is trapped in Russia and desperate for information from the British Embassy that will help him escape. When Terry agrees to help him, the CIA, the KGB, British intelligence, and sundry other law enforcement organizations are all hot on her tail as she tries to help the beleaguered British agent. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Laverne (Penny Marshall) and Shirley (Cindy Williams) despair when the troublesome Lenny (Michael McKean) and Squiggy (David L. Lander) move into the apartment just above their own. Things get worse for the girls when, after a quarrel with Squiggy, Lenny moves in with them. His efforts to transform the girls' flat into his idiotic concept of a bachelor pad is but one of the reasons that Lenny finds himself "persona non grata" with his new roommates. This episode was written by series costars David L. Lander and Michael McKean together with comic actor Harry Shearer, who years later would collaborate with McKean on such satirical films as This is Spinal Tap and A Mighty Wind. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Exploiting the overwhelmingly positive audience response to the 1975 Happy Days episode in which Richie (Ron Howard) and Potsie (Anson Williams) found themselves on a riotous date with brash but lovable "older women" Laverne De Fazio (Penny Marshall) and Shirley Feeney (Cindy Williams), executive producer Garry Marshall obligingly whipped up a spin-off series showcasing these two supporting characters, logically titled Laverne & Shirley. Most of the familiar pieces are already in place during the series' 15-episode inaugural season: roommates Laverne and Shirley work at Milwaukee's Shotz Brewery along with zany beer-truck drivers Lenny (Michael McKean) and Squiggy (David L. Lander); the girls occasionally hang out at the Pizza Bowl, owned by Laverne's widowed father, Frank (Phil Foster); and while long-suffering Shirley bounces from one loser boyfriend to another, Laverne has a fairly steady relationship with the preening, self-consciously macho Carmine (Eddie Mekka). All that is missing from season one is the girls' landlady Edna Babish, though Helen Page Camp is seen in a handful of early episodes as apartment manager Mrs. Havenhurst. In order to assure Laverne & Shirley a well-attended launching, Happy Days star Henry Winkler appeared as "The Fonz" in the new series' first two episodes. By the time the season-one finale "Mother Knows Worst" (featuring Pat Carroll in her only appearance as Shirley's mom) rolled around, Laverne & Shirley was America's second most popular series (just guess what was number one!). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When Laverne & Shirley signed on in January of 1976, America's top-rated program was Happy Days -- of which Laverne & Shirley was, of course, a spin-off. By the time the last-named series entered its third season, it had climbed to the coveted number one slot, while Happy Days had retreated to number two. Season three opens with a typically slapsticky entry, "Airport '59," wherein Laverne (Penny Marshall) and Shirley (Penny Marshall) end up at the controls of a passenger plane. Later on, in the series' first two-parter, "Cruise," our heroines take a vacation on a luxury liner, only to be saddled with a pair of stowaways -- none other than their Shotz Brewery co-workers Lenny (Michael McKean) and Squiggy (David L. Lander). In a subsequent installment, 1950s singing idol Fabian shows up as Laverne & Shirley's first era-appropriate guest star. And in a brace of physical-humor tours de force, "The Obstacle Course" and "2001: A Comedy Odyssey," the girls (a) become police recruits and (b) imagine what their lives will be like in old age. But for all its hilarious hijinks, the third season's most memorable episode is also its most moving and poignant: "The Slow Child," guest-starring Linda Gillen as Amy Babish, the mentally challenged daughter of Laverne and Shirley's landlady, Edna Babish (Betty Garrett). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide