In a Hollywood career spanning more than 40 years, Billy Crystal has directed just four feature films. While he’s appeared in a broad range of comedies, his rare efforts behind the camera tend to be more narrowly focused on autobiographical stories and a few personal themes. (Even his sports film,
61*, grew out of his childhood love of the New York Yankees.) That’s definitely true of Crystal’s latest movie,
Here Today, which feels in many ways like a bookend to his directorial debut, 1992’s
Mr. Saturday Night. Both films are about aging comics (played by Crystal) who try to maintain their relevancy in a changing world while they also grapple with the collateral damage their fame took on their families.