‘The Holdovers’ Will Win Da’Vine Joy Randolph an Oscar
Beautifully performed, extremely funny, and deeply emotional, Alexander Payne’s 1970s-set holiday-season dramedy The Holdovers (Oct. 27) seems destined for awards success. While Payne’s direction is strong and screenplay stellar, the film’s most worthy win would be for its supporting actress, Da’Vine Joy Randolph. Randolph delivers a quiet, precise, and perfect performance that elevates her already impressive body of work to new exceptional highs.
The Holdovers takes place at Barton Academy, a prestigious New England boarding school. It’s there we find Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti), a curmudgeonly teacher of ancient history who’s just discovered he’s responsible for the “holdovers,” a group of students who won’t be returning home for Christmas. The only other adult remaining on campus for the two-week period is Mary Lamb (Randolph), the head cook at the school. She’s staying behind to make sure the kids have food—although, as she reminds Paul, they’ll have to rely on whatever ingredients are already on campus. But Mary, like Paul, wasn’t planning on leaving Barton anyway, for heartbreaking reasons.
It’s not long after the film first introduces Mary that we find out why that is. Mary doesn’t enjoy having the spotlight put on her, but that’s exactly what happens at the school’s last church service before the Christmas break. We learn that Mary’s son Marcus was just killed in the Vietnam War, just one year after graduating from Barton Academy—which the priest uses to remind everyone of how grateful they should be for their own lives and families. As if the attention placed on her wasn’t frustrating enough, that remark seems to particularly affect Mary, who sits quietly, clearly wishing she were anywhere but here.