Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine

Last updated
Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine
Sarah Cooper Everything's Fine.jpg
Created by
Written by
Directed byNatasha Lyonne
StarringSarah Cooper
Country of originUnited States
Production
Executive producers
Cinematography Polly Morgan
Running time49 minutes
Original release
ReleaseOctober 27, 2020 (2020-10-27)

Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine is an American comedy special starring comedian Sarah Cooper with a series of sketch comedies featuring guest appearances from various celebrities. Netflix released the special on October 27, 2020. The special was created by Cooper, Maya Rudolph, and Natasha Lyonne, and was directed by Lyonne.

Contents

Synopsis

Sarah Cooper portrays a fictionalized version of herself, hosting the morning show Everything's Fine. Fred Armisen plays "Scooter", Cooper's producer, who wears strange outfits meant to serve as personal protective equipment. [1] [2] Maya Rudolph plays the meteorologist. [3]

Cooper conducts interviews of Megan Thee Stallion, who portrays herself, and Ben Stiller, who portrays "8008s", a robot who is the chief executive officer of a tech company. [2] Jon Hamm portrays a satirized version of Mike Lindell, the Trump-supporting founder of My Pillow. [4] Aubrey Plaza plays a host of a QVC-like home shopping network that is part of the QAnon conspiracy theory. [3] [5] Jane Lynch plays a baker who is a guest on the show, who turns out to be a "Karen", calling the police on Cooper. [6] Whoopi Goldberg provides narration for a pseudodocumentary on the history of "Karens". [1]

The special also has Cooper lip synching public statements made by Donald Trump, Ivanka Trump, Melania Trump, and Kellyanne Conway. [6] They also recreate the Donald Trump Access Hollywood tape, with Cooper lip synching Trump, Helen Mirren playing the role of Billy Bush, and Jonathan Van Ness portraying Arianne Zucker. [7] Others who appeared in the special include Connie Chung, Winona Ryder, Marisa Tomei, Danielle Brooks, Tommy Davidson, Jordan Black, Marcella Arguello, and Eddie Pepitone. [8] Tom Kane provided narration for the special. [9]

Background

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Cooper was a stand-up comedian who hosted and performed at open mic nights. When the pandemic required comedy clubs to close, she began making videos and posting them to TikTok, hoping they would become viral. After President Trump began hosting briefings on the pandemic, Cooper started making videos in which she lip synched Trump's words. [10]  Cooper went viral with the video titled "How to Medical", a 50-second video in which she lip synched Trump's suggestion of injecting ultraviolet light or disinfectants to fight COVID-19 infection during a coronavirus task force meeting, on April 23, 2020. [11]  She signed with William Morris Endeavor in June. [12]  

Development

In June 2020, Cooper began speaking with Rudolph and Natasha Lyonne, who founded a production company, Animal Pictures, with Danielle Renfrew Behrens. They developed a comedy special, which became the first project to be greenlit by Animal Pictures. [13] Cooper had the idea of basing the special on a morning show where the host "ends up under the desk" having a mental breakdown due to being overwhelmed by the negativity in the news. [14] She cited Mr. Show with Bob and David as an influence, as she wanted the segments to relate to each other. [3] Lyonne likened the "societal paranoia" conveyed by the special to Network and A Face in the Crowd . [4]

Sarah Cooper performing stand-up comedy Sarah Cooper.png
Sarah Cooper performing stand-up comedy

Netflix picked up the special in August, with Lyonne set to direct, and Cooper and Paula Pell serving as executive producers. [15] The special was written by Cooper, Pell, Lyonne, Rudolph, Cole Escola, and Jake Fogelnest. [16]  Polly Morgan served as the cinematographer. [4]  They had no budget for music, so Rudolph and Armisen created their own music. [17] Production was a rush because of their desire to release the special before the 2020 United States presidential election, which was to take place on November 3. [18]

It took two months from the initial meeting between Cooper, Lyonne, and Rudolph, to the beginning of filming. The special was filmed in five days [18] in Los Angeles. [19] Filming included COVID-19 safety protocols, including daily COVID-19 testing, wearing masks, and 15 minute ventilation breaks for every two hours on set. [20] Though the ventilation breaks were supposed to be taken outdoors, some of them had to be taken indoors due to the poor air quality resulting from the August 2020 California lightning wildfires. [18] The special has a run time of 49 minutes, and was released on October 27. [21]

Reception

The New York Times called Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine "a celebrity-rich, intermittently funny sketch show that hangs on a narrative of apocalyptic doom." [1] Variety wrote that it was a "non-stop parade of celebrity cameos and leftover Saturday Night Live sketches that often feel too long." [2]

The film review website Metacritic gave an aggregate score of 71 out of 100, which indicates "generally favorable reviews". [22] Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a score of 63% with the consensus, "Sarah Cooper's comedic charisma is as charming on screen as it was on social media, but a lack of thematic cohesion and an uneven ratio of successful skits make her first special merely Fine." [23]

The Associated Press named Cooper one of its Breakout Performers of 2020. [24]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maya Rudolph</span> American actress and comedian (born 1972)

Maya Rudolph is an American actress and comedian. Born in Gainesville, Florida, and raised in Los Angeles, she is the daughter of singer Minnie Riperton and composer Richard Rudolph. In 2000, Rudolph became a cast member on the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live (SNL). During her tenure on the show, she played supporting roles in the films 50 First Dates (2004), A Prairie Home Companion (2006), and Idiocracy (2006).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natasha Lyonne</span> American actress and filmmaker (born 1979)

Natasha Bianca Lyonne Braunstein is an American actress and filmmaker. Known for her distinctive raspy voice and tough persona, she is the recipient of two Screen Actors Guild Awards, as well as nominations for five Primetime Emmys and two Golden Globes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cobie Smulders</span> Canadian-American actress (born 1982)

Jacoba Francisca Maria "Cobie" Smulders is a Canadian actress. She is known for her starring role as Robin Scherbatsky in the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother (2005–2014) and as S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Maria Hill in the Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero franchise, from the film The Avengers (2012) until the Disney+ limited series Secret Invasion (2023).

Danielle RenfrewBehrens, or simply Danielle Renfrew, is an independent film producer with credits ranging from grassroots documentaries to major motion pictures. She has worked with prominent entertainment personalities including Quentin Tarantino, Elizabeth Banks, Courteney Cox, Nick Cannon, and Lily Tomlin. Renfrew is currently head of Animal Pictures, which she runs with Natasha Lyonne and Maya Rudolph. Animal Pictures' releases include comedy special Sarah Cooper: Everything’s Fine and film Sirens, which was selected for Sundance Film Festival 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fred Hechinger</span> American actor (born 1999)

Fred Hechinger is an American actor. He began his career with supporting roles in such films as the coming-of-age film Eighth Grade (2018), the period drama News of the World (2020), and the psychological thriller The Woman in the Window (2021). Also in 2021, he starred in the Netflix horror The Fear Street Trilogy (2021) and the first season of the HBO anthology series The White Lotus (2021). He has since portrayed Seth Warshavsky in the miniseries Pam & Tommy (2022).

Jacqueline Novak is an American stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and published author. Her off-Broadway, one-woman show Get On Your Knees was a New York Times "Critic's Pick.", and her performance was nominated for a 2020 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Solo Performance. In 2024, Get On Your Knees was made into a Netflix special, directed by Natasha Lyonne.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paper Kite Productions</span>

Paper Kite Productions is an American film and television production company founded by actress and producer Amy Poehler. It is known for producing the series The Mighty B!, Broad City,Difficult People, Making It, Russian Doll, and Duncanville.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TikTok</span> Chinese video-focused social media platform

TikTok, whose mainland Chinese counterpart is Douyin, is a short-form video hosting service owned by ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from 3 seconds to 10 minutes.

<i>Russian Doll</i> (TV series) American comedy-drama television series

Russian Doll is an American comedy-drama television series, created by Natasha Lyonne, Leslye Headland, and Amy Poehler, that premiered on Netflix on February 1, 2019. The series follows Nadia Vulvokov (Lyonne), a game developer who repeatedly dies and relives the same night in an ongoing time loop and tries to solve it, leading to her finding Alan Zaveri in the same situation. It also stars Greta Lee, Yul Vazquez, Elizabeth Ashley, and Chloë Sevigny.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarah Cooper</span> Jamaican-American comedian and author (born 1977)

Sarah Anne Cooper is an American author and comedian based in New York City. She worked in design for Yahoo! and in user experience for Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides while also performing stand-up comedy. Cooper left Google to focus full-time on writing and comedy. Her first two books, 100 Tricks to Appear Smart in Meetings and Draw What Success Looks Like were published in 2016. Her third book, How to Be Successful Without Hurting Men's Feelings, was published in 2018.

<i>Irresistible</i> (2020 film) 2020 American political comedy film written and directed by Jon Stewart

Irresistible is a 2020 American political comedy film written and directed by Jon Stewart. It stars Steve Carell in the lead role, Chris Cooper, Mackenzie Davis, Topher Grace, Natasha Lyonne, and Rose Byrne. The film follows a Democratic strategist who tries to help a candidate win a local election in a small right-wing town. Originally set for a theatrical release in May 2020, the film was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, and then released on Premium VOD and selected theaters on June 26, 2020, by Focus Features. It received mixed reviews from critics, who called it "a soft political satire".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Taylor Tomlinson</span> American stand-up comedian (born 1993)

Taylor Elyse Tomlinson is an American stand-up comedian, writer, and television host. She has released two Netflix stand-up specials, Quarter-Life Crisis (2020) and Look At You (2022). She is the host of the CBS late-night show After Midnight, which premiered on January 17, 2024.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Charli D'Amelio</span> American social media personality (born 2004)

Charli Grace D'Amelio is an American social media personality. She was a competitive dancer for over a decade before starting her social media career in 2019, when she began posting dance videos on the video-sharing platform TikTok. She quickly amassed a large following and subsequently became the most-followed creator on the platform in March 2020 until she was surpassed by Khaby Lame in June 2022. With over 151 million followers, she is the second-most-followed-person on TikTok, as of 2024.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dixie D'Amelio</span> American social media personality (born 2001)

Dixie Jane D'Amelio is an American singer and social media personality known for her videos on TikTok. She is the elder sister of Charli D'Amelio. As of November 2022, she has over 57.5 million followers and 3.3 billion likes on TikTok, 24.2 million followers on Instagram, and 7.04 million subscribers and 619.12 million views on YouTube, where she also hosts a talk show called The Early Late Night Show.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Triller (app)</span> American social networking service

Triller is an American video-sharing social networking service. The service allows users to create and share short-form videos, including videos set to, or automatically synchronized to music using artificial intelligence technology. Triller was released for iOS and Android in 2015, and initially operated as a video editing app before adding social networking features.

Saturday Night Live is an American sketch comedy series created and produced by Lorne Michaels for most of the show's run. The show has aired on NBC since 1975.

<i>Saturday Night Live</i> parodies of Joe Biden

The sketch comedy television series Saturday Night Live (SNL) has parodied President Joe Biden since 1991, covering his time as a United States Senator, his time as Vice President under President Barack Obama, during his campaign to defeat president Donald Trump for the presidency, and as the president of the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Donald Trump–TikTok controversy</span> 2020–2021 event

In 2020, the United States government announced that it was considering banning the Chinese social media platform TikTok upon a request from then-president Donald Trump, who viewed the app as a national security threat. The result was that TikTok owner ByteDance—which initially planned on selling a small portion of TikTok to an American company—agreed to divest TikTok to prevent a ban in the United States and in other countries where restrictions are also being considered due to privacy concerns, which themselves are mostly related to its ownership by a firm based in China.

<i>Big Mouth</i> (season 4) Season of television series

The fourth season of Big Mouth, an American adult animated coming-of-age sitcom created by Andrew Goldberg, Nick Kroll, Mark Levin, and Jennifer Flackett, was released on Netflix on December 4, 2020. The series centers on teens based on Kroll and Goldberg's upbringing in suburban New York, with Kroll voicing his fictional younger self. Big Mouth explores puberty while "embrac[ing] a frankness about the human body and sex."

Cole Anderson-James is a British YouTuber, social media personality and actor.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Zinoman, Jason (October 27, 2020). "What Happens When Sarah Cooper Speaks in Her Own Voice?". The New York Times. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  2. 1 2 3 Ray-Harris, Ashley (October 27, 2020). "Sarah Cooper's 'Everything's Fine' Is a 2020 Time Capsule, but not Much More: TV Review". Variety. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  3. 1 2 3 "How 'Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine' Landed Those Wild Celebrity Cameos". The Hollywood Reporter. 27 October 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  4. 1 2 3 "How Sarah Cooper, Maya Rudolph, and Natasha Lyonne pulled off wild new special 'Everything's Fine'". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  5. ↑ Li, Shirley (October 28, 2020). "Sarah Cooper's Humor Is Not What You Thought". The Atlantic. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  6. 1 2 Roeper, Richard (October 27, 2020). "'Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine': Trump lip-sync artist works well with others". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  7. ↑ Desta, Yohana (27 October 2020). "Sarah Cooper, Helen Mirren Mock Trump Access Hollywood Tape in Netflix Special". Vanity Fair. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  8. ↑ "Sarah Cooper's Netflix Special: All the Guest Stars and Who They Play". The Wrap. October 27, 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  9. ↑ Daniels, Karu F. (31 December 2020). "Following stroke, 'Star Wars' voice actor Tom Kane loses speaking ability". New York Daily News. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  10. ↑ Nordstrom, Leigh (October 27, 2020). "Sarah Cooper, In Her Own Words". Women's Wear Daily. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  11. ↑ Marks, Andrea (October 27, 2020). "'I Have to Pinch Myself': Sarah Cooper's Rapid Rise From Trump TikToker to Netflix Star". Rolling Stone . Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  12. ↑ "TikTok Trump Impersonator Becomes Hollywood Commodity: "It's Been Insane"". The Hollywood Reporter. 26 June 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  13. ↑ Myers, Amanda Lee. "Sarah Cooper's lip-syncing journey from TikTok to Netflix". The Daily Progress. Associated Press. Retrieved January 1, 2021.[ permanent dead link ]
  14. ↑ "TikTok Trump Impersonator Sarah Cooper Lands Netflix Comedy Special". The Hollywood Reporter. 12 August 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  15. ↑ Aurthur, Kate (August 12, 2020). "Trump Lip-Syncher Sarah Cooper Sets Netflix Special Directed by Natasha Lyonne". Variety. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  16. ↑ Berkowitz, Joe (October 27, 2020). "Sarah Cooper's Netflix special is an October surprise—for Trump". Fast Company. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  17. ↑ "Natasha Lyonne on Highlighting the "Chaos and Horror" of 2020 in Sarah Cooper's Netflix Special". InStyle. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  18. 1 2 3 Jackson, Angelique (October 27, 2020). "Natasha Lyonne and Maya Rudolph on Teaming Up for Animal Pictures and Helen Mirren's Cameo in 'Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine'". Variety. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  19. ↑ "TikTok Breakout Star Sarah Cooper on the Inspiration for Her 'Cinematic' Netflix Comedy Special". People. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  20. ↑ "Sarah Cooper's Trump Lip-Syncs Turned Into a Career Catapult". Ad Week. 26 October 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  21. ↑ "Sarah Cooper's Netflix special is a 2020 mood: dark". Los Angeles Times. October 27, 2020. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
  22. ↑ "Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine Reviews". Metacritic . Retrieved December 14, 2020.
  23. ↑ "Sarah Cooper: Everything's Fine". Rotten Tomatoes . Retrieved December 14, 2020.
  24. ↑ "AP Breakthrough Entertainer Sarah Cooper: TikTok to Netflix". ABC News. Associated Press. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.