3rd Street Blackout

Studio: Paladin
Directed by Negin Farsad & Jeremy Redleaf

Apr 28, 2016 By Stephen Mayne Web Exclusive

Welcome to the Negin Farsad and Jeremy Redleaf show. They write, direct, produce and star together in 3^rd Street Blackout, a confidently self-conscious romantic comedy that finds fresh ideas buried in the well-mined theme of pre-social media nostalgia. The narrative spine used to prop up a series of finely tuned riffs is a flimsy construction, but it can creak all it wants when every observation comes so beautifully formed.

Mina (Negin Farsad) and Rudy (Jeremy Redleaf) are lovers for our age. She’s a hip neuroscientist, he’s a corporate code developer/improver yearning for something more. Together they live a New York life of techno bliss, texting from a few feet away, blitzing TV catch-up sessions, and connecting with the world in just about every way apart from the physical.

Two things enter to change their lives. A hurricane sweeps New York, knocking out electricity in Manhattan, and Mina gets herself in a somewhat compromising situation with handsome British investor Nathan (Ed Weeks) after she’s delivered a barnstorming TED talk. Thus the scene is set to tear apart their relationship and reconnect the heart of NYC now forced from the virtual to the real.

Romantic shenanigans are the weakest part of 3^rd Street Blackout. Jumping between TED talk drinking sessions a few days back, and the present, the “did Mina cheat, will it wreck their relationship?” plot is a damp squib. There’s never any sense the stakes really matter for either of them, the entire narrative structure one giant hat stand on which they hang all the interesting asides. But the asides are quite something.

Chock full of weird and fascinating characters, particularly Rudy’s friends Christina (Katie Hartman) and Ari (Jordan Carlos) with whom he’s just won a hackathon and $5,000, and underscored by hip music and shots of the more happening parts of New York City, the film comes at a relentless pace. One-liners and kooky observations fly left, right, and centre as New Yorkers hit the streets to look each other in the eye once more.

Cut off from the virtual, citizens take to impromptu street performances, chalk based games, parties and even sex. At the heart of it all there’s Mina and Rudy. Farsad’s Mina gets an awful lot of brilliantly dirty punchlines, and standout bonding moments with elderly neighbor Susan (Phyllis Somerville), while Redleaf brings bubbling nerdiness to Rudy, particularly in a wonderful confrontation involving ear punching and indiscriminate roaring. It sounds weird, and it is, but it’s also kind of fantastic.

With unengaging romance and a “put down your phones and embrace life” message, 3^rd Street Blackout could have been a trite mess. Instead, good-natured New York hipster ribbing, and a self-deprecating approach to electronic obsession proves a whole lot of fun. If this is what happens when the modern world disconnects, perhaps we should all go off grid.

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