By Liz Locke, Staff Writer and owner cinemasips.com

By the time anyone reads this, our communities will have endured nearly thirteen months of social distancing and staying home to prevent the spread of COVID-19. After struggling to make sense of the past year (a struggle that involved losing myself in a lot of movies and A LOT of cocktails), I think I’ve finally hit on an idea that makes this bizarre period a little more comprehensible: We’ve all been living in a Neil Simon rom-com. We just didn’t know it at the time.

To prove this theory, I watched two of my favorite films, The Goodbye Girl (1977) and Barefoot in the Park (1967), both based on Simon stage plays. They follow familiar rom-com tropes (enemies-to-lovers and opposites-attract, respectively), and feature the trademark witty banter I’ve come to expect from this legendary playwright/screenwriter. But in viewing the works through a 2020 lens, and making a list of how they compared to my own pandemic life, it’s obvious Neil Simon has been preparing us for catastrophe all along:

1) Most of the action took place in a single location.

Both Barefoot and Goodbye Girl are set in small Manhattan apartments the characters rarely leave. At some point while watching these movies, you might think to yourself, “Wait, is this it? Just two people bickering in an apartment?” Indeed, that is it. That was it, for the last thirteen months.

2) Everyone fought with their mothers.

Whether your mom was of the ‘everything’s fine—what virus??’ persuasion, or the ‘wraps herself in cellophane to check the mail’ camp, I’m willing to bet most of us had a family squabble or two about safety last year. And once again, Neil Simon understands. He gave Barefoot’s Corie a fun adversary in Ethel Banks, a woman who doesn’t appreciate the romance of living in a glorified tenement, and Goodbye Girl’s Paula a bratty pre-teen who loves to remind her mom of all the ways in which she’s a failure at dating. Mothers—we love them, but sometimes they just don’t get it

3) Groceries were a minefield.

Look, times were tough. We had to make very fast decisions under very difficult circumstances, and maybe you forgot to get eggs one week. Maybe you didn’t understand why your partner couldn’t just go to the store for more eggs because you do it EVERY DAMN WEEK and one trip wouldn’t kill them (probably). Maybe you did drink the last Diet Coke out of spite over the egg thing, but would never admit to it. Maybe you finally went to the store for more eggs, but dropped your bag of groceries in the parking lot and cried on the asphalt. We were all Paula McFadden in 2020.

4) Very few supporting players.

If you saw anybody at your house last year, it was probably a service person or solitary family member. Just like a Neil Simon script! Very few stage entrances and exits, very limited cast, all of which translates to a claustrophobic, tension-filled time on-screen and in person.

5) We wanted to strangle our significant other, until we realized we’re actually nuts about this person.

Corie and Paul bickered about the cold, Elliot and Paula about panties on the shower rod, and the rest of us about whose turn it was to do the dishes. But when times got tough, when there were job losses or family drama or frustration with our leaders, it helped to know there was a person in the other room who could make us laugh, despite our anxiety. A person who could put up with our Animal Crackers tendencies and still want to fondle us all day.

6) Creative date nights.*

While we couldn’t pop out to our favorite ethnic restaurant à la Barefoot in the Park, I took a cue from Goodbye Girl and had some romantic dinner parties for two on the back patio. There were twinkle lights, there were Gershwin tunes, and maybe even some Humphrey Bogart impressions (okay, actually Richard Dreyfuss-doing-Bogie impressions). And it was magic.

7) Hair got wild. 

When Jane Fonda shows up on screen with a hair profile bigger than her body, I know I’m in for a good time. Unfortunately, I couldn’t wrangle my mane into one of her frothy up-dos last year, but it did get pretty long. And my dog definitely had a huge amount of fluff after several skipped grooming appointments.

8) Everybody redecorated.

I think Neil Simon must have a secret interior design fetish because both Barefoot and Goodbye Girl feature heroines who redecorate their homes. I can’t judge whether Corie or Paula did it better (they both have very unique styles), but I will say that many of us followed their lead last year. I redid my bedroom and patio, and from what I’ve heard, the home improvement industry as a whole was booming. When it’s just the same people in the same place, you’ve got to do something to mix it up.

9) We got very, very drunk.

So drunk, that maybe you really did walk barefoot in the park. Maybe you stumbled around your pad leaving shards of cheap furniture in your wake. I hope you didn’t hang off roofs or window ledges, but if you’re reading this, you made it. You probably had a hangover, but you survived. That IKEA nightstand however…

10) We had to move past sudden loss, without the opportunity to say goodbye.

It’s all in the title- The Goodbye Girl. Paula McFadden gets dumped in a letter, simultaneously evicted, and has to figure out a way to put her life back together. Many of us lost someone last year, and all of us lost the day-to-day existence we’d come to depend on. There was never a chance to say goodbye to our normal lives—Tom Hanks tested positive, toilet paper vanished, and that was that. I hope, like Paula, you were able to pick yourself back up and realize you’re stronger than you thought you were. I hope you saw that something good could come from abrupt change, even when you couldn’t imagine what tomorrow would look like. I hope you found time for laughs and love. 

Cheers!

*If you’re looking to turn these movies into a date night double feature, I’d also suggest mixing up a Lambrusco Sour! A fizzy riff on the New York Sour, this pairs perfectly with a bubbly heroine like Corie Bratter or a complex, jaded New Yorker like Paula McFadden.

Lambrusco Sour

1 ½ oz Whiskey

¾ oz Lemon Juice

¾ oz Simple Syrup

Lambrusco sparkling red wine

Lemon twist (garnish)

Combine whiskey, lemon juice, and simple syrup in a shaker with ice.  Shake until chilled, then strain into a champagne flute. Pour Lambrusco very slowly over the back of a spoon so it layers over the top of the whiskey mixture. Garnish with a twist of lemon.