There are three relatively substantive roles for female actors over the age of 50 in actor-turned-film-maker Cody Fern’s talky drama Closing Night. It’s a sadly impressive feat even at a time when the industry has slowly become more aware that women don’t get sent to a farm upstate after their 40th birthday.
Instead they usually get sent to work with Ryan Murphy on television and his shadow looms over Australian actor Cody Fern’s debut as writer-director. Fern worked with him on three seasons of American Horror Story and one of American Crime Story and while there are many legitimate criticisms to be levelled at Murphy and his specific brand of sensationalist television (reaching a new low with last year’s criminally awful legal drama All’s Fair), he has continued to provide sustained work for many women who had otherwise been put out to pasture by the industry. For Closing Night, Fern has recruited Sarah Paulson, who once said she owes Murphy “everything” after super-sizing her career, Naomi Watts, who has now starred in four Murphy shows, and Dianne Wiest, who despite winning two Oscars has admitted she has struggled to financially sustain herself with the amount of work she has been offered.
