The Opening Act

The Opening Act is an 2020 film. The movie stars Jimmy O. Yang. The main supporting cast are Alex Moffat, Cedric the Entertainer, Jermaine Fowler, and Neal Brennan. The rest of the cast show up in more of a cameo sense and include Debby Ryan, Ken Jeong, Roy Wood Jr., Bill Burr, Russell Peters, Iliza Shlesinger, and Whitney Cummings. The movie is the directing debut of Steve Byrne.

Jimmy O. Yang plays Will Chu, a insurance claims worker who does stand up at a local club. Will's dream is to be a stand up comedian, but is scared to go all in. When a local friend presents him with an opportunity, Will has to decide to take it or not. Will goes all in and even quits his job. Will is "the opening act" and emcee of a weekend at a Improv with a famous established comedian, Billy G. Will Will be able to impress the right people and get his chance at a life of stand up?

This was a coming of age story movie. You can kinda see it from the trailer and you knew it was going to be an happy ending. However, with any coming of age story, the middle portions will be ripe with failure and self doubt, before they get it together to succeed.

I really enjoyed this movie. I had had my eye on this for many months and finally pulled the trigger a weekend ago and got it off Amazon Prime Video. I spent 3 sessions to finish this over the week right before I started on Jimmy's Love Hard. Which made my family confused as they walked by to see me watching Yang for over a week. Jimmy O. Yang is great and I hope him much success in the future. I highly recommend this movie.

Part of the movie does dive into the protaginst as an Asian American. It does not ask for pitty, but it is one of the roadblocks that was faced. I thought it was dealt with well.