What makes a great artist? What makes a great artistic legacy? What’s the worth of complicated humanity and authenticity in an age of art-as-commerce? Can there even still be such a thing as true authenticity in art if it’s only going to become a commercial product?
You’d imagine that any of these questions would be hard enough to confront even in some protracted seminar series or desperately researched dissertation, but here comes the irrepressible Steven Soderbergh to put it all on blast in a 100-minute joy of a film that’s almost entirely just two characters talking in an old house.
It’s “The Christophers,” the new semi-comedic, semi-satirical character-studying drama directed by the persistently expectation-eschewing Soderbergh and written by Ed Solomon, the co-creator of “Bill & Ted,” writer of “Men in Black” and “Now You See Me,” and one of the last people you’d peg to pen a sharp, thoughtful deconstruction of arts world contentions.
But sharp and thoughtful it is.
“The Christophers” is a film of surprising depth and conceptual density given its remarkably small and interpersonal scale, and of surprising emotional weight given its director’s general aversion to overt sentimentality, and OKC audiences can catch it right now at AMC Quail Springs and opening Friday, May 1st at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
It all centers on (the recently rocketing) Michaela Coel as Lori, a quietly struggling, working-class artist (and part-time art forger) in London who’s approached by the entitled and irate adult children of infamously spiky, once-legendary painter Julian Sklar, played with diva-like venom and scene-heisting glee by the masterful Sir Ian McKellen.
See, Sklar’s kids are worried that the washed-up old man is going to die without leaving them any kind of worthwhile inheritance (on account of him generally hating them for being terrible and greedy,) so they’ve hatched a plan. They want Lori to pose as a new housekeeper/assistant for the aged Sklar and steal the long-unfinished final pieces in his most acclaimed and valuable series of paintings, the “Christophers.”
Once nicked, they want Lori to employ her forgery skills to finish the pieces in Sklar’s style to be passed off as the hoarded works of a recluse and sold for millions once he dies.
And so begins a comic battle of wits as Lori infiltrates Sklar’s shut-in life and attempts to navigate his inflated ego and eternal grudges with secrets and revelations carried as concealed weapons, like a 21st century, art-world “Sleuth.”
Or at least it all feels like that’s the direction it’s headed in throughout the first act.
But it wouldn’t be Soderbergh without at least a small implosion of expectations, and just as it seems like it’s settling in as a farce-riddled comedy of secrets and lies, all of that pretense gets pretty suddenly waived away, and in its place remains a refreshingly human tête-à-tête.
From there, “The Christophers” lobs its questions at legacy, at criticism, at “cancel culture” and modern reevaluations of problematic figures, at the soulless capitalism of the modern art world, at the blurred line between artist and celebrity, and ultimately at the underlying emotional stakes that might just be a required element of any meaningful artwork.
And as you might suspect, it’s all just a showcase for the talents of Coel and McKellen.
Any film so reliant on the unique combat of conversation requires a level of acting that can elevate “talking” to actual fun, and while you can easily expect Sir Ian to pull that off as a prickly, critical ham built purely from ego and hurt feelings, Coel is the revelation here.
She stands toe-to-toe with McKellen the entire time and maintains just as strong and compelling of a presence with a much quieter, much more closed-off, and maybe even much more difficult role, one with no shortage of deeply harbored and unspoken feelings and motivations, as opposed to Mckellen’s Sklar, who speaks everything all the time.
It all feels so much like it could be a stage play, but it might actually lose something if it was. It needs the claustrophobia of the cramped, old house and the quiet, internal moments that can often only be captured in close-up.
And again, it feels almost wholly unlike Soderbergh, sidestepping much of his usual cynicism and his tendency toward unraveling systems and institutions.
Here, it’s just two people on opposite ends of the social spectrum, both hurt and betrayed by the same fickle meat-grinder that is the fine arts world, and both slowly learning that authenticity in art isn’t about style or technique, but about the intentions and motivations at its heart.
It’s an actor’s film, first and foremost, but it’s also a must-see for anyone that’s struggled to figure out their own creativity among criticism or their own artistic voice in the face of all those questions about legacy, viability, sales, and audience expectations.
And getting to watch it in a place like OKCMOA, where just outside the theater doors are hundreds of works by artists that made it to the gallery walls despite navigating all of the same questions and doubts, is an experience that might just be too good to pass up.
“The Christophers” is now playing at AMC Quail Springs and opens Friday, May 1st at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
Catch Brett Fieldcamp’s film column weekly for information and insights into the world of film in the Oklahoma City metro and Oklahoma. | Brought to you by the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
Brett Fieldcamp is the owner and Editor in Chief of Oklahoma City Free Press. He has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly two decades and served as Arts & Entertainment Editor before purchasing the company from founder Brett Dickerson in 2026.
He is also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
