The Tragedy of Hollywood’s Insufferable Smugness

Empathy is effective and hard. Condescension is its opposite.

In 2006, George Clooney won the Academy Award for Supporting Actor for his movie Syriana. He started his speech with an attempt at self-deprecating humor about his name becoming synonymous with winning an Oscar, playing the role of Batman, and winning People magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive.” He went on to praise Hollywood celebrities for leading the dialogue on the AIDS crisis and civil rights, and making Hattie McDaniel the first Black person to win an Oscar. He ended by expressing his pride in being as out of touch with the rest of the world as Hollywood celebrities are accused of being, because, he argued, that distance allowed Hollywood to achieve progress in areas where the world hadn't caught up.

That speech was one of the cringiest moments ever recorded. It was arrogant, smug, and condescending. It’s enough to make your soul vomit.

The speech is infamous now, in large part due to a South Park episode later that year where the kids met people who were so self-righteous that they loved the smell of their own farts, and George Clooney’s speech created a literal “smug cloud” that was so dangerous, it threatened national security. That episode captured the discomfort that many of us weren’t able to place a finger on at the time: George Clooney’s speech was an example of rich celebrities talking down to the rest of us, and disguising it as humility and progress.

Don’t Look Up is writer and director Adam McKay’s latest in a growing slate of politically focused movies, and I thought of the smug cloud before I watched it. The capital-D “Discourse” had already begun, a summary of which is fairly straightforward: Audiences thought it was fine, and critics absolutely hated it. A brief synopsis for those who need it: Two astronomers discover a comet on a trajectory to destroy the Earth, and as they try to appeal to the government, media, and general public to take the threat seriously, they’re faced with everything from skepticism and apathy to comet-denying conspiracies and government propaganda. It’s intentionally written with a sledgehammer, and is meant to hold a mirror to our collective response to the crises of today.

Some criticism of Don’t Look Up might relate to factors outside of the movie itself. Such a high concentration of Hollywood celebrities in a political, message-driven movie can be distracting, to say the least: Leonardo DiCaprio, Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence, Cate Blanchett, Rob Morgan, Jonah Hill, Tyler Perry, Ron Perlman, Timothée Chalamet, Ariana Grande, and more can feel like a lot, and risks landing as a smug cloud on par with Clooney’s 2006 speech, no matter how they perform. An army of A-list celebrities pointing out our societal flaws feels inherently out of touch, but it’s perhaps their union in such a politically heavy-handed Adam McKay movie that created something so uniquely grating that it can strike a nerve the way this movie has with so many people.

Don’t Look Up is partly a victim of its timing. Since it came out in the middle of an ongoing pandemic, much of the movie’s audience seemed to believe it was about the public response to COVID-19. It was actually intended to satirize the public response to climate change—only a second catastrophe had gotten in the way, and by the time the movie was released, the government response, public fear, and subsequent conspiracies had become far too familiar to be shocking or particularly funny. Skepticism, apathy, and conspiracies have become our new normal, so satirizing it is a challenge akin to comedians trying to satirize former President Trump. How do you exaggerate what is already inherently and openly bombastic?

But Don’t Look Up also uses the tone of condescension that has intermittently shown itself in Adam McKay’s work. As he pivoted from writing comedies like Anchorman, Step Brothers, and The Other Guys to politically focused dramedies like The Big Short, Vice, and Succession, his work alternated between talking with audiences and talking at them. At their best, his scenes feel like dark cynicism lightened by charming celebrity wit; at their worst, they feel like the deservedly maligned post-credits scene from Vice, which depicted a group of young women as vapid and apathetic, and looked down at them—and millions of us—for watching Fast & Furious movies. Don’t Look Up is a full-length-film version of that scene’s tone. It condescends towards those viewers it’s trying to convince.

While it’s a mistake to conflate an interest in popular entertainment with stupidity, the bigger problem with that scene—and with Don’t Look Up—is that condescension is an ineffective approach to changing anything for the better. If you expect satire to challenge your thinking, change your mind, or help you look at something in a way you hadn’t before, then you’ll find Don’t Look Up to be a failure: Those who need to understand its message are being too insulted to listen to it, and those who already agree are invited to relish the smell of their own farts. It’s the opposite of what a “meaningful” story with a “message” is supposed to do.

The power of stories is in tricking people into recognizing something that they otherwise wouldn’t, like a Trojan horse filled with empathy. Get Out comes with some of my favorite examples of satirical moments that reflect an uncomfortable reality without hitting its audience over the head, like the scene showing casual racism at a garden party and mocking messages of faux solidarity. A recent episode of Last Week Tonight With John Oliver called “Vaccine” also comes to mind, where instead of making fun of vaccine skeptics, the comedian points out that “the vaccine hesitant generally don’t respond well to hearing from politicians, celebrities, or athletes,” so his celebrity status is virtually meaningless in efforts to change their minds. He approaches their skepticism with pragmatic empathy instead.

Empathy is effective but hard, and condescension is the opposite of empathy. With an issue like the opioid crisis, for example, here’s how I would rank the likelihood of changing people’s minds about drug addiction:

1. Knowing an addict personally

2. Watching Euphoria

…

15. Sharing drug facts

29. The “just say no” campaign

316. Being condescending

Talking down to your audience will always be counterproductive, and the ironic result for Don’t Look Up is that it’s about as effective as the Fast & Furious franchise in delivering any kind of meaningful message. At least Fast & Furious knows it’s stupid, whereas satire is meant to be smart.

This isn’t to say that Don’t Look Up can’t be entertaining. And people who enjoyed it likely also enjoyed the validation it offers. For some people, Don’t Look Up serves as a funny vindication that the world around you has lost its mind, and that there’s little left to do other than cherish the consolation of being right before we all die.

But it’s useful to understand why Don’t Look Up failed for so many people, if only to learn from its mistakes: Bringing together Hollywood's A-list names in a political satire can make for a dangerous level of navel-gazing that is borderline insufferable. But more importantly, empathy is always more effective than condescension.

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I need to start with an apology to everyone who emailed me following last week’s essay about television and money. It was the most popular essay in Humans Being thus far, and I’ve yet to dig myself out of my inbox. Prior to this week I had responded to every single email I received on this journey, and now I have to live with this L, but I’ll catch up soon. Keep ’em coming; I love hearing your thoughts.

My favorite email came from Alejandro, who sent an email that basically just said “Am I first?” before writing back an hour later with a thoughtful email about his relationship with money. He apologized for the initial email, saying that the desire to win the book got to his head.

Alejandro, I still owe you an email, but more importantly, there’s nothing to apologize for! Get these free books, people! Most of these are hardcovers! (For winners who haven’t received their books yet, I’m making a trip to the post office soon.)

Until then, 11 days until Saga returns. We’re in the endgame now.