Ilana Glazer is taking her “Broad City” persona to the next level: parenthood. Glazer co-wrote coming-of-age buddy comedy “Babes” with Josh Rabinowitz to chart the hilarity of becoming a parent while still being very much an adolescent at heart.
“Babes” follows inseparable childhood best friends Eden (Glazer) and Dawn (Michelle Buteau), two New York City natives who find themselves in different phases of adulthood. When carefree and single Eden decides to have a baby on her own after a one-night stand, their friendship faces its greatest challenge yet, especially as the more responsible Dawn is already a mother of two.
The dramedy marks Pamela Adlon‘s feature directorial debut, and alongside Glazer and Buteau, co-stars John Carroll Lynch, Oliver Platt, Sandra Bernhard, Stephan James, and Hasan Minhaj. Co-writers Glazer and Rabinowitz produced the feature along with Susie Fox, Breean Solberg, and Ashley Fox.
“Babes” debuted at SXSW 2024, where our own IndieWire review compared the film‘s humor to the “groundbreaking dialogue Glazer brought to ‘Broad City.’” The review included that, following Adlon’s acclaimed FX series “Better Things”, “Babes” has the “elegance and gravitas of a Woody Allen movie, with both Adlon and Glazer confidently accepting the fact that the burden of dictating their generation’s cultural depictions of parenthood now falls on them.”
The review concludes, “After a decade of speaking for fans who threw the old-fashioned steps of the success sequence out the window, it’s fitting that Glazer is now showing them which ones might be worth bringing back into the fold.”
Additional SXSW titles that debuted at the festival include buzzy romance “The Idea of You” starring Anne Hathaway and Hunter Schafer’s horror film “Cuckoo.” The two actresses will also star in upcoming “Mother Mary” together post sharing the festival marquee.
Blockbusters “The Fall Guy” and “Road House,” which already broke Prime Video streaming records upon its release, respectively were also screened at the festival. “Road House” starring Jake Gyllenhaal reached 50 million worldwide viewers through its second streaming weekend, with actor Gyllenhaal’s jaw-dropping stunts (ahem, a “Fall Guy” connection!) fully on display.
A Neon release, “Babes” premieres May 17 in limited theaters, expands on May 24, and has a wide release on June 7. Check out the film’s first trailer below.
