''My Dead Boyfriend'' is a 2016 American comedy film directed by Anthony Edwards and starring

Heather Graham Heather Joan Graham (born January 29, 1970) is an American actress. After appearing in television commercials, her first starring role in a feature film came with the teen comedy ''License to Drive'' (1988), followed by the critically acclaimed ...

Katherine Moennig Katherine Sian Moennig (; born December 29, 1977) is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Shane McCutcheon on ''The L Word'' (2004–2009), as well as Jake Pratt on ''Young Americans'' (2000). Moennig played the role of Lena in ...

Scott Michael Foster Scott Michael Foster (born March 4, 1985) is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Captain John Paul "Cappie" Jones in the ABC Family comedy-drama series ''Greek'' (2007–11), Leo Hendrie in the ABC Family drama ''Chasing Life'' ...

, and

John Corbett John Joseph Corbett Jr. (born May 9, 1961) is an American actor and country music singer. On television, he is best known for his roles as Chris Stevens on '' Northern Exposure'' (1990–1995), Aidan Shaw on ''Sex and the City'' (2000–2003 ...

. The film is based on

Arthur Nersesian Arthur Nersesian is an American novelist, playwright, and poet. Nersesian is of Armenian and Irish descent. He was born and raised in New York City, and graduated from Midwood High School in Brooklyn, New York. His novels include ''The Fuck-u ...

's 2000 novel ''Dogrun''. It was released on November 3, 2016 by

Orion Pictures Orion Pictures (legal name Orion Releasing, LLC) is an American film production and distribution company owned by Amazon through its Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) subsidiary. In its original operating period, the company produced and released films ...

and

Momentum Pictures Momentum Pictures is a film distributor and a subsidiary of Entertainment One, itself part of Hasbro. Prior to 2013, it was a brand of Canadian distributor Alliance Films used for its releases in the United Kingdom, and was one of the leading i ...

Plot

Mary's life has been defined by a string of temp jobs and a half-hearted attempt to become a writer, but all that changes when she comes home to find her couch potato boyfriend dead in front of the TV set.

Cast

as Mary McCrawley *

as Howard *

as Zoey Bryant *

Griffin Dunne Thomas Griffin Dunne (; born June 8, 1955) is an American actor, film producer, and film director. Dunne studied acting at The Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in New York City. He is known for portraying Jack Goodman in '' An Amer ...

as Kaleb Giles *

as Primo Schultz * Martha Millan as Sue Watt * Lizzi Bougatsos as Marilyn *

Angela Featherstone Angela Featherstone is an actress, writer, director, and advocate for children in foster care. She grew up in the Nova Scotia and Manitoba provinces of Canada. Career Modeling Within a year of emancipating herself from foster care at age ...

as Norma *

Viola Harris Viola Harris (July 5, 1920 – August 23, 2017) was an American actress known for roles in television, theater and film from the 1950s to the 2010s. Career Harris appeared in a number of films including Woody Allen's ''Deconstructing Harry'' i ...

as Ms. Schulz *

Gina Gershon Gina L. Gershon (born June 10, 1962) is an American actress. She has had roles in the films ''Cocktail (1988 film), Cocktail'' (1988), ''Red Heat (1988 film), Red Heat'' (1988), ''Showgirls'' (1995), ''Bound (1996 film), Bound'' (1996), ''Face/ ...

as Helene * Andre Ward as Miss Vicki * Edwin Cahill as Ted * Isa McCutcheon as Herman * Bailey Edwards as Jeff * Salma Valentina as Frankie * Jennifer Regan as Minnie *

Tina Huang Tina Huang, born on October 28, 1981,Di Lauro, Janet. "trask master". ''Soap Opera Digest''. January 31, 2022, vol. 47, no. 4, pp. 30-33 is an American stage and television actress of Taiwanese descent known for her recurring roles in ''Rizzoli & ...

as Stripper Mimi

Reception

The film received negative reviews and has a 0% rating on

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

based on reviews from 11 critics. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

the film has a score of 25% based on reviews from 6 critics.

Neil Genzlinger Neil Genzlinger is an American playwright, editor, book reviewer, and theatre and television critic who frequently writes for ''The New York Times''. Family Genzlinger is a grandson of the late ''The Philadelphia Bulletin'' columnist Don Rose. ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' wrote that the film "desperately tries to look and sound like a quirky indie hit, but that’s not an achievable goal when you have an unlikable lead character indifferently rendered by a name star."

Frank Scheck Frank Scheck is an American film critic. He is best known for his reviews in the ''New York Post'' and ''The Hollywood Reporter''. He formerly edited ''STAGES Magazine'' and worked as a theater critic for the ''Christian Science Monitor Ch ...

of ''

The Hollywood Reporter ''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...

'' wrote that the film "never achieves a consistent narrative or stylistic tone. Instead, it relies far too heavily on the charms of its wide-eyed star, who, despite her best efforts, can't overcome the fact that her role should be played by a much younger actress. Twenty years ago, this comedy might have been a slightly amusing diversion. Now it just exudes an air of sweaty desperation."

Christy Lemire Christy A. Lemire (née Nemetz; born August 30, 1972) is an American film critic and host of the movie review podcast ''Breakfast All Day''. She previously wrote for the Associated Press from 1999 to 2013, was a co-host of '' Ebert Presents at ...

of RogerEbert.com gave the film one star.

References

External links

* * 2016 films American comedy films Films based on American novels Orion Pictures films 2016 comedy films 2010s English-language films 2010s American films English-language comedy films {{2010s-comedy-film-stub