Nate Bargatze’s Feature Debut ‘The Breadwinner’ Opens in Theaters — Here’s What the Reviews Say
Nate Bargatze makes his big-screen debut in The Breadwinner, a domestic comedy about a dad managing his three daughters while his wife chases a business opportunity. The Sony film opens Friday with a mixed-to-lukewarm critical reception and Bargatze’s ‘Nate Rate’ discount ticket push.
- The Breadwinner, Nate Bargatze’s feature film debut, opens in theaters Friday via Sony; he plays Nate Wilcox, a Nashville Toyota salesman forced to manage his three daughters while his wife (Mandy Moore) travels to South Korea for a business opportunity she pitched on Shark Tank
- The supporting cast includes Kumail Nanjiani, Colin Jost, Will Forte, Zach Cherry, Martin Herlihy, and Kate Berlant; the real Shark Tank investors appear as themselves in a cameo sequence
- Critical reception has been mixed-to-lukewarm: Hollywood Reporter calls it “inoffensive to the point of total boredom,” while ComingSoon gives it a 6/10 and calls it “surprisingly watchable” with the Shark Tank scene as a standout
- Bargatze co-wrote the script with Dan Lagana; it is adapted from material in his own stand-up, and he confirmed the film’s end credits include clips of the actual stand-up routines the movie scenes are based on
- Bargatze personally suggested to theater owners that they offer discounted tickets under what he’s calling the “Nate Rate” — and says they were immediately on board; he also gave an update on his planned Nashville theme park Nateland, saying it is “far along” with land secured
Nate Bargatze has spent years selling out arenas with stand-up. Starting Friday, he’s trying to sell tickets to a movie. The Breadwinner, his first feature film, opens in theaters via Sony with a premise that’s very much in his wheelhouse: a good-natured dad, out of his depth, trying to hold things together while his wife gets a shot at something bigger.
Bargatze plays Nate Wilcox — the character shares his first name, which is either charmingly self-aware or exactly what you’d expect — a Toyota salesman in Nashville whose wife Katie (Mandy Moore) gets the chance to take her organizational business system overseas after a Shark Tank appearance. Nate agrees to stay home and care for their three daughters (Stella Grace Fitzgerald, Birdie Borria, Charlotte Ann Tucker) for two weeks. Chaos, in the PG-rated sense, ensues.
The director is Eric Appel, who co-wrote the script with Bargatze and Dan Lagana. The supporting cast includes Kumail Nanjiani as a preening rival colleague, Colin Jost as a fellow stay-at-home dad, Will Forte as a useless roofer who basically moves in, and Kate Berlant in what critics describe as a criminally underused role.
What the Critics Are Saying
The reviews are in, and they’re mostly polite about their reservations. Hollywood Reporter called it “inoffensive to the point of total boredom” and “thoroughly bland,” noting that Bargatze’s deadpan stand-up persona works on stage but “onscreen he seems mostly on the verge of a coma.” The review acknowledged the film wastes a talented supporting cast on one-note roles.
ComingSoon was warmer, giving it a 6/10 and calling it “surprisingly watchable” for a film with low expectations. The review praised a Shark Tank sequence where Nate is summoned from backstage mid-doughnut bite and single-handedly tanks the pitch — “sharp, well-timed” — as the kind of joke the movie needed more of. The film’s heavy product placement for Toyota, Walmart, and KFC also got called out as one of its stranger quirks: ComingSoon described it as “Product Placement: The Movie.”
UPI’s review filed via Yahoo News landed somewhere in the middle: nostalgic for the kind of inoffensive mid-budget comedy that used to come out every week but noted the film bends over backwards to avoid any real conflict. “The Breadwinner would never go there,” the review noted of a missed opportunity for sharper domestic comedy, “lest it broach a method with which an audience member might disagree.”
Bargatze on the Film — and What Comes Next
Bargatze, speaking to Hollywood Reporter ahead of the release, described the project as closely tied to his real-life material. His actual daughter’s personality is spread across all three fictional daughters in the film. “Charlotte — the youngest [in the movie] that’s very outgoing and can start dancing and was very funny — we see a lot of that in my daughter when she’s at home with us,” he said. A horse that walks through the front door in one sequence — and really did have to be brought into a real family’s house — also made an impression. “The horse could act better than I could,” he said.
On the ticket pricing front, Bargatze said he came up with what he’s calling the “Nate Rate” — a suggestion that theaters offer discounted tickets for families — and that the response was immediate. “I want The Breadwinner to be a movie everybody can come see. Families, grandparents, kids — everybody,” he told Hollywood Reporter. “Theaters were very supportive right away. They’ve been just as excited about it as I have.”
He also gave an update on Nateland, his planned Nashville theme park, which he’s been teasing for a while. “We’re narrowing down on a site, and we’ve got some land,” he said. “I’m hoping we can announce a lot more stuff later in the year. We’re even now creating what the park is going to be looking like and the rides and just the experience.” As for what kind of movies he wants to make next: “I want to really live in that PG, PG-13 range and just really continue to build that trust with the audience.”
The Breadwinner is in theaters now.
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