When a movie goes off the rails, I try to imagine the elevator pitch that got the movie approved. The pitch for The Stand In might have been The Patty Duke Show meets Single White Female or maybe The Princess Switch meets All About Eve. Come to think of it, either of those ideas would be more entertaining than this strange and not in a good way movie about look-alikes who change places.
The opening credits of The Stand In coyly identify the stars of the film as Drew Barrymore AND Drew Barrymore, while we hear a singer tell us about living in two worlds. Barrymore s strongest asset as a performer is her imperishable sunniness, even when playing a zombie cannibal ( Santa Clarita Diet ). She seems to be trying to extinguish every bit of that in The Stand In, playing two characters who are both whiny, selfish, and unpleasant. Not even Barrymore can save it, burdened with an ugly prosthetic nose, haystack hair, and not one but two earache-inducing voices. It s like Ba