My top 10 movies of 2022 are coming (later, although an early list is out there on the Internet if you want to scour for it) — but I wanted to take a step back and celebrate the culture at large today. Movies are but one part of a larger cultural ecosystem of entertainment, engagement, and occasional enlightenment. Today, in a completely random assortment of moments from this year assembled in an iPhone note over the last month, I take a look back at the things that made 2022 the year it was.
ELMO/ROCCO FEUD
Who knew we had a petty king on our hands? He was real for this.
KIMBERLY AKIMBO
The first of a few NYC-specific shoutouts, but this off-Broadway musical charmer about a teenage girl with a condition that makes her age five times faster than her peers set a high bar for theater that made me laugh and cry and feel. I now get to gloat that I saw it before the Broadway transfer — if you get the chance, don’t miss this original delight. I feel warm even thinking about it.
WORDLE AND THE EXPLOSION OF DAILY GAMES
As an inveterate board game guy, it was nice to feel like there was a fad designed specifically for ME. Wordle’s cryptic green/yellow emoji blocks took over social media early in the year, and it’s not clear if people are still playing and just not posting … or if this is just a relic of how bored we were during the bleak days of Omicron winter. Either way, I didn’t watch “Wheel of Fortune” at the dinner table every night growing up to just walk away from Wordle — I also still regularly play the Box Office Game, Framed, Heardle, and Actorle.
NICOLE KIDMAN AMC AD CULTURE
It’s hard to pinpoint at what point in early 2022 people decided that Nicole Kidman’s pre-show bumper for AMC Theater went from cringe to camp. But I’m glad movie lovers have this common prayer of sorts to unite us all.
MADDIE VS. CASSIE / EUPHORIA MEMES
Don’t ask me about all the great TV I didn’t make time for this year — The Bear, Andor, The Rehearsal — while I did clear my Sundays for what I respectfully call “meme shows” like Euphoria and The White Lotus. I think both have their moments of brilliance but feel a bit reverse engineered for people like me, creatures of the Internet. Case in point: counterprogramming the literal Super Bowl with the catfight to end them all on Euphoria. Trash lined with just enough taste that people buy it!
JULIA FOX
She’s an icon, she’s a legend, and she is the moment. Where to even BEGIN with Julia Fox’s wild 2022? Obviously, uncuhh gahhms:
That Juergen Teller shoot of her vamping against mounds of gray snow?
Her declaration that her unfinished book “is, so far, a masterpiece”?
Her insistence that she only dated Kanye to protect Kim Kardashian? Never change, Julia Fox, you glorious agent of chaos.
ANDREW GARFIELD’S AWARDS CAMPAIGN
Not this man making me cry at the 92nd Street Y on a random Tuesday! (Cued up the tearjerking moment below.)
Every interview, every outfit (if you saw me cop some of his style no you didn’t), every appearance just felt like watching a guy who just has something figured out. And part of figuring that out was realizing how impossible it is to figure anything out and just finding peace and contentment anyways. I’m genuinely happy for the actor who captured my eternal sympathy and identification as Eduardo Saverin. He remains my white whale interview. Publicists, if you’re listening…
ROBERT PATTINSON’S THE BATMAN PRESS TOUR
We don’t have enough genuine weirdo stars letting their freak flag fly. Robert Pattinson, thank you for being you. Please make more movies so you can do more press.
AMANDA SEYFRIED DANCING TO “HOW TO LOVE”
And she saved us from having to deal with a cringey Adam McKay version of the Theranos story! Amanda Seyfried, you will see heaven for The Dropout, a portrait of alumni from St. John’s School the world needed to have imprinted on their brain.
YOUN YUH-JUNG SIGNING FOR TROY KOTSUR’S OSCAR WIN
And the winner for best use of hands at the 94th Academy Awards goes to…
MARK ASCH’S CONCEPT OF “ACTOR BRAIN”
Once you know, you won’t stop thinking about it when actors get all in their outsized sense of self-importance. A thread to remember:
CHRISTINE BARANSKI GLARING AT ELON MUSK
She knew.
ANNE HATHAWAY MAIN CHARACTER ERA
I have always loved her, but this is the year that Miss Anne Hathaway decided to step on the necks of the Hathahaters. If you can’t bring yourself to love her after 2022, seek treatment.
ALI SLAGLE RECIPES AND I DREAM OF DINNER
The cookbook I won’t shut up about! Recipes with 8 ingredients or less that you can make in 45 minutes or less. I salivate thinking about the brussel sprout and farro carbonara.
ELIZABETH OLSEN LIE DETECTOR VIDEO
Underrated weird celebrity! The end of this video is packed with gems…
…but none better than her reflexive dismissal of Danielle Haim’s acting skills in Licorice Pizza with the absolutely withering “oh yeah, she was fine.”
ZIWE INTERVIEWING CHET HANKS
I should be better about watching her Showtime show as more than just clips on social media, but Ziwe is doing the Lord’s work by giving celebrity cringe just enough rope to hang itself.
THE CULTURAL OMNIPRESENCE OF TOP GUN MAVERICK
To quote Vin Diesel: “the movies!” It was nice to have a movie once again with cross-generational appeal that hit with critics and audiences alike. I may not understand how the Internet flipped for Miles Teller in a movie where Glen Powell was RIGHT THERE, but good for Top Gun Maverick all the same.
THE LAS CULTURISTAS CULTURE AWARDS
The glorious culmination of Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang’s electric energy resulted in the kind of comedic cornucopia I’m convinced will end up documented as a real moment in time.
For those who couldn’t be there, enjoy…
TOM HANKS SAYING “HE’S WHITE” IN ELVIS
I despised this movie but have to tip my hat to a line reading that I will just randomly hear in my head like a haunting demon. Quite the journey for Kodi Smit-McPhee from Oscar nomination to this in 2022.
CASSIDY HUTCHINSON’S TESTIMONY
Best episode of television all year.
RYAN GOSLING’S “KENERGY”
Release this man from doing brooding dramas and LET HIM BE FUNNY.
SNOOKI TROLLS DR. OZ
Maybe the most effective, out-of-the-box political communication since … I don’t even know?! Genius, no notes.
FUNNY GIRL CASTING CAROUSEL / LEA MICHELE CAN’T READ
My heart breaks for Beanie Feldstein, but I’m frankly glad this QAnon for theater nerds went mainstream because of Lea Michele’s antics.
"SUMMER RENAISSANCE”
A song that’s such a bop that I must listen to it in all four seasons. This may have replaced the disco hookup of Bradley Cooper and Amy Adams in American Hustle as my favorite use of Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love.”
SONDHEIM EVERYWHERE
Though the legend of musical theater passed away in late 2021, it feels like the real tributes to his legacy only started pouring in this year. From the Into the Woods revival that has taken Broadway by storm, to upcoming productions of Merrily We Roll Along and Sweeney Todd, and not to mention an upcoming cameo I won’t spoil, the giant in the sky continues to smile on us.
INDUSTRY SEASON 2 ON HBO
I caught up on the best show everyone is sleeping on as a random review assignment, and it really deserves to be your next binge. Supporting player Harry Lawtey is one of those “OK this guy is a star” talents you spot early — and some have tipped him for the next James Bond. Say you knew him before!
TASTE OF STREEP LIVE SING-A-LONG OF MAMMA MIA!
The moment I finally “got” why people tolerate this movie. Frankly, you haven’t lived until you’ve screamed ABBA in a room full of strangers.
DON’T WORRY DARLING VENICE ROLLOUT
More dramatic than Shakespearean tragedy, more comedic than theatrical farce, I just simply don’t have the words to express what a delight it was to witness this Hot Mess Express ™️ and be so close to the blast radius. (I did, in fact, sit a row away from the scene of the crime in Spitgate the next morning.)
Miss Flo! The Chris Pine dead eyes meme! Harry Styles rambling about movies feeling like movies! The SPIT! The ongoing scandal of Olivia Wilde’s behavior, who seems like she made some mistakes but does not deserve quite the level of cultural crucifixion she’s received.
THE QUEEN’S DEATH
Not celebrating that she died, of course. But this was genuinely one of the most unhinged days of Internet behavior since … probably when Trump got COVID? Where to even BEGIN (although Vulture did a great compilation).
TITANIQUE
An uproarious night of theatrical entertainment that asks “What if Celine Dion was aboard the Titanic and the movie was a jukebox musical of the Canadian pop star’s hits?” I have not laughed this hard in a long, long time.
LYDIA TÁR ISN’T REAL
TÁR has got to be the oddest movie to become a meme in a minute. At first I was annoyed that we were literally dealing with discourse at the level of “No, Lydia Tár Is Not Real.” But now I embrace the glorious low-culture-fication of such a highbrow character. Maybe this is the real punishment Todd Field had in mind for her after all.
EDWARD HOPPER’S NEW YORK
The most revelatory museum-going experience of the year for me, and you still have a chance to go if you’re in New York before March! It was fascinating to see Hopper’s urban tableaus all arranged together — after five years living here, I could connect to the odd sense of solitude that you can only find in such a densely populated area.
ASTROS WIN THE WORLD SERIES
U mad? Knock on wood, Houston saved you from a recession…
KAMALA HARRIS REBORN AS CAMP ICON
The strangest second act in American politics I’ve ever seen.
JULIA ROBERTS’ GEORGE CLOONEY DRESS
She’s still one of the best stars we have, and she will LET! US! KNOW!
SPOTIFY WRAPPED
Where I wince at what I spent over 60,000 minutes funneling into my eardrums in 2022. Might as well just put it all out there for the people to see.
I just know that the second I hit send on this newsletter, I’ll think of a dozen other things that made 2022 such a fun year. But this is quite the sampling platter all the same, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reliving it too! Thanks for being along for the ride with me this year through it all.
Yours in service and cinema,
Marshall