The reigning diva on the daytime serial "The Sun Also Sets" is conspired against by her co-workers after ratings begin to slip; meanwhile, her life outside the show has turned into a real soap opera when secrets from the past catch up with her. It wouldn't be wise to knock a gregarious piece of fluff such as "Soapdish" too strongly--not only does the film have its share of supporters (late-in-coming, as it turns out), but a bauble like this, with its fake-glitzy surroundings and eager-to-please cast, can be a nostalgic tonic for those pining for the era of the television soap opera. Now a vanishing breed, the once-popular morning-to-afternoon melodrama was the housewife's cure for the game show blues, complete with diseases of the week, hunks without their shirts romancing aging ladies in glamorous gowns, outrageous story lines and 'controversial' topics. "Soapdish" takes all of this into consideration, yet it has tunnel-vision; it isn't sharp enough to foresee the genre's ultimate decline (this is a world where everything can be fixed with a juicy subplot). Sally Field is miscast in the central role; as an actress, she's a trouper--and indefatigable--but she isn't convincing as a harried queen bee (she's been made too vulnerable by the writers, who have her crying too much). Director Michael Hoffman has obviously done his homework on the subject, and yet his treatment may be too heady for this cheap, flashy milieu; Hoffman goes in for 'feelings' with his 'sensitive' edits, but the characters are still cut-outs to us because they haven't been fleshed out in the writing. The material in general is too broad and silly, anyway, to get worked up over, although Whoopi Goldberg has nicely dry comic timing as the head writer of the show and Kathy Najimy manages to make her thankless wardrobe girl role stand out just by playing it nonchalant. ** from ****
Review of Soapdish
