August 6th, 2009
Ron Satlof
Ron Satlof, Ira Pearlstein
Orlando Jones, A.J. Cook, Sarah Carter, Sam Ball, David Sutcliffe, David Moscow
Lineage Pictures
Comedy, Drama
conquistadehollywood.com/MISCONCEPTIONS.htm, eclecticfilmsales.com/misconceptions/index.html
NONE
1 hour 45 minutes
This lighthearted comedy pokes fun at the culture wars, and the debate over same-sex parenting. Southern gal Miranda is an Evangelical Christian with all the social and political beliefs dictated by her church, but when she gets what she’s sure is a message from God, she does a 180 and decides to become a surrogate mother for a married gay couple from Boston. It’s a weird enough situation as it is, but things get even crazier for Miranda when one of her baby-daddies-to-be decides to come down South for a Plot
The story centers on a religiously conservative, married southern woman who receives a message from God instructing her to act as a surrogate mother and carry a child for two married gay men who live in Boston - a Jewish doctor and and African-American dance choreographer. All Hell breaks loose when the African American man comes to her home down south to micro-manage her pregnancy, and he won’t leave.
SYNOPSIS
The project stars A.J. Cook (CBS’ “Criminal Minds”) as a religious conservative who receives a message from God telling her to act as a surrogate mother for two gay men desiring to raise a child.
A male couple wanting to raise a child find an unlikely donor in “Misconceptions,” which hinges on the broad comic contrast between liberal gay Bostonians and born-again small-town Georgians. Auds who can get past the sitcomish air of contrivance and caricature will find a painless tolerance lesson that duly resolves all conflicts for a blanket happy ending. Regent has announced a fall theatrical release, though everything here — from the cast’s TV credentials to the formulaic dramedy beats — signals lightweight smallscreen fare.Since their son died of “Dietrich-Schygulla syndrome,” evangelicals Miranda (A.J. Cook) and Parker (David Sutcliffe) have been at odds — she desperately wants another child, while he refuses even to make the necessary whoopee. Strangely, while watching a talkshow, she decides God wants her to play surrogate to sperm-donating “godless atheistic Sodomites” Terry (Orlando Jones) and Sandy (David Moscow). Hiding this from Parker gets harder once irrepressible Terry shows up to help with Miranda’s advancing pregnancy. Meanwhile, her barren sister’s own surrogate tempts her husband away. Stereotypes abound, and the soundtrack is annoyingly wallpapered with campily deployed hymns, but the perfs, guileless good intentions and competent assembly prove diverting enough.
