John Early Thinks Missy Elliott Still Doesn’t Get Enough Credit

Maddie’s Secret Feels Like an Attempt to Outrun Irony

John Early’s ‘Maddie’s Secret’ feels like an attempt to outrun irony. In the comedian’s directorial debut — a strange, delightful homage to TV movies — he plays a food influencer with an eating disorder.

John Early can do it all in the larger-than-life melodrama-comedy Maddie's Secret

Wickedly sharp and surprisingly moving, John Early’s Maddie’s Secret is a melodramatic comedy like few others. Mixing in influences as varied as Todd Haynes and Douglas Sirk with afterschool TV specials and a level of camp perfected in movies like But I’m A Cheerleader, Early’s feature debut is a refreshing send-up of TV and movie tropes that embraces sentimentality with a cheeky sense of humor. Taking on the competitive world of social platform…

John Early Thinks Missy Elliott Still Doesn’t Get Enough Credit

In the surreal comedy Maddie’s Secret, in theaters June 19, John Early plays a food influencer struggling with an eating disorder as her career goes viral. But even Early, who cites Divine and Charles Busch as some of his biggest inspirations, isn’t sure whether the role counts as a drag performance. “I wanted the movie to feel like a fairytale set in contemporary life, and so it was very important to me that she be glowing,” he says of Maddie’s…

“It Was Our Job to Commit”: John Early on the Roman Empire, Paul Verhoeven, and Maddie’s Secret

Comedian John Early has been waiting for his film to be seen by audiences. Premiering at TIFF last fall, Early’s directorial debut is a sublime comedy that commits to simultaneously becoming a serious drama about a woman with a returned eating disorder. Maddie’s Secret, which Early also wrote and leads, plays like a 1980s TV movie. But its hokey, stilted dialogue is an advantage. Early’s film—its successful comedic and dramatic moments—feel whol…