''Papi Chulo'' is an American-Irish

comedy-drama Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

film directed and written by

John Butler John Butler may refer to: Arts and entertainment *John "Picayune" Butler (died 1864), American performer *John Butler (artist) (1890–1976), American artist * John Butler (author) (born 1937), British author and YouTuber *John Butler (born 1954), ...

, starring

Matt Bomer Matthew Staton Bomer (born October 11, 1977) is an American actor. He is the recipient of accolades such as a Golden Globe Award, a Critics' Choice Television Award, and a Primetime Emmy Award nomination. In 2000, he made his television debut o ...

and

Alejandro Patiño Alejandro Patiño is an American actor. He has guest starred on several television programs including the recurring role of Ralph, Gabrielle Solis's new gardener, on the ABC series '' Desperate Housewives''. Other appearances include '' House'' ...

. It premiered at the

2018 Toronto International Film Festival The 43rd annual Toronto International Film Festival was held from September 6 to 16, 2018. In June 2018, the TIFF organizers announced a program to ensure that at least 20 percent of all film critics and journalists given press accreditation to ...

Plot

Sean, a solitary and alienated television weatherman, drives past a middle-aged Hispanic migrant worker standing outside a hardware store looking for work. He decides to hire this kind-looking man, to paint his deck and for someone to talk to, in this darkly comedic reflection on class, ethnicity, and companionship in contemporary Los Angeles. Sean is young, gay and white; Ernesto, portly, straight and married. Despite having nothing in common and a language barrier, they build a sort of friendship, until Sean becomes consumed with a deeper obsessive need.

Cast

as Sean *

as Ernesto * Elena Campbell-Martinez as Linda *

Wendi McLendon-Covey Wendi McLendon-Covey (née McLendon; born October 10, 1969) is an American actress and comedian. She is known primarily for her work in comedic and improvisational roles. Since 2013, McLendon-Covey has played the role of Beverly Goldberg, a fam ...

as Ash * Michael Shepperd as Stan * Tommie Earl Jenkins as Tom * Edgar Arreola as Elisio *

Ryan Guzman Ryan Anthony Guzman (born September 21, 1987) is an American actor and former model, known for his lead roles as Sean Asa in ''Step Up Revolution'' and '' Step Up: All In'', part of the ''Step Up'' film series, as Noah Sandborn in the erotic p ...

as Rodrigo * Shaughn Buchholz as Mike *

D'Arcy Carden D'Arcy Beth Carden (born Darcy Beth Erokan, January 4, 1980) is an American actress and comedian. She is best known for her starring roles as Janet in the NBC sitcom ''The Good Place'' (2016–2020) and Greta Gill in the Prime series ''A League ...

as Susan

Release

''Papi Chulo'' had its world premiere at the

Toronto International Film Festival The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF, often stylized as tiff) is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1976, TIFF has grown to become a permane ...

on September 8, 2018. The film also screened at

BFI London Film Festival The BFI London Film Festival is an annual film festival founded in 1957 and held in the United Kingdom, running for two weeks in October with co-operation from the British Film Institute. It screens more than 300 films, documentaries and shor ...

; the

Torino Film Festival The Torino Film Festival (also called the Turin Film Festival, TFF) is an international film festival held annually in Turin, Italy. Held every November, it is the second largest film festival in Italy, following the Venice Film Festival. It was f ...

on November 23, 2018; the

Palm Springs International Film Festival Palm Springs International Film Festival (sometimes stylized shortly as PSIFF) is a film festival held in Palm Springs, California. Originally promoted by Mayor Sonny Bono and then sponsored by Nortel,here for Table of Contents it started in 1989 ...

on January 6, 2019; and the

Dublin International Film Festival The Dublin International Film Festival (DIFF; ) is an annual film festival held in Dublin, Ireland, since 2003. History Dublin International Film Festival was established in 2003. It was revived by Michael Dwyer, international film critic and ' ...

on February 20, 2019. It then released in select theaters on June 7, 2019.

Reception

Critical response

Review aggregation website

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 ...

gives the film rating, based on reviews, with an average rating of . The site's consensus reads: "''Papi Chulo'' is a cross-cultural comedy that mostly avoids the pitfalls of its premise, largely thanks to the chemistry between its well-matched leads." Another aggregator,

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 ...

, gave the film a score of 42 out of 100, based on 11 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Accolades

References

External links

* * {{Rotten-tomatoes, papi_chulo_2018, Papi Chulo 2018 films 2018 comedy-drama films 2010s English-language films Films set in Ireland Irish comedy-drama films American LGBT-related films LGBT-related comedy-drama films American comedy-drama films Irish LGBT-related films 2018 LGBT-related films 2010s American films