Kayla Pospisil (Margot Robbie), a fictional Fox News producer, is apparently dreading an imminent meeting with ogre-ish Fox honcho Roger Ailes (John Lithgow). Also unsettled, it seems, are fellow elevator riders Megyn Kelly (Charlize Theron) and Gretchen Carlson (Nicole Kidman). They’re so rattled by what may be in the offing (or what’s in the air) that they don’t even small-talk each other. Then Carlson says it’s “hot in here.”
Pospisil (weird last name, a mashing of “possum” and “possible”) and Carlson get out, but the coolly observant Kelly doesn’t.
After the oddly muted response to Showtime’s The Loudest Voice, the Bombshell challenge will be to prove itself as the bigger, better, more pointed Ailes drama, above and beyond the marquee-name aspect.
Directed by Jay Roach and scripted by Charles Randolph, Bombshell will pop theatrically on 11.20. If it’s any kind of award-calibre thing…well, we’ll see.
Bombshell costars Kate McKinnon, Connie Britton, Mark Duplass, Rob Delaney, Malcolm McDowell and Allison Janney.