‘Why did you stay with me all those years if you knew that we were doomed?’
Mike Birbiglia is an American stand-up comedian and filmmaker beloved on the comedy circuit in his home country but fairly unknown in the UK. He came to my attention due to his excellent 2016 film, Don’t Think Twice, a wonderful meditation on the arts and friendship. Sleepwalk with Me, his debut film, is not quite as accomplished as the latter, but it is a sweet and good-natured dramedy that is easy to like…
Matt Pandamiglio (Birbiglia) is a struggling stand-up (a bartender really), who starts having strange dreams and subsequently sleepwalking after his long-term partner, Abby (Lauren Ambrose), asks him for more commitment. This sparks a crisis of sorts that motivates Matt to pursue his comedy career with more vigour. The supporting cast boasts James Rebhorn and Carol Kane as Matt’s despairing parents, Cristin Milioti as Matt’s sister, as well as cameos from comedy legends Kirstan Schaal and Marc Maron.
Based on Birbiglia’s acclaimed one-man show of the same name, Sleepwalk with Me is clearly a very personal project for its creator, and while many of the things that the central character is dealing with will be familiar from any number of similar films and TV shows from American comedians, Birbiglia is such a disarming onscreen presence that it’s impossible not to root for him, even as his moral code becomes ever more elastic. While the film’s director and star delivers an authentic and grounded performance, it is Ambrose who really shines here. As an actor who is seemingly great in everything in which she appears, I’m surprised that she hasn’t had more of a mainstream career.
At 80 minutes, Sleepwalk with Me is a slight film, and it often feels more like the pilot for a new TV show rather than a feature film in its own right, but anyone who has suffered the kind of adulthood ennui and indecision of being a thirtysomething stuck in arrested development will pick up what Birbiglia is putting down here. On a sidenote, if you haven’t heard his Frank Sinatra story, I would urge you to at least enjoy that at the first available opportunity.
