I’m so glad I saw Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass.
Glad, because it’s very funny, perhaps the funniest film of the year so far
But also glad because Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass is absolutely terrifying.
You should see it.
Yes, I’m serious
I’m aware you probably don’t want to.
I didn’t want to1
At the screening I attended yesterday, I was literally the only person in the theatre.
That’s never happened before. It’s been close, there have been many, many times in my life I’ve been one of three people attending a movie but it’s never, ever only been me.
How did I know it was only me? Two minutes before the film started an usher approached and said “Hey man, not to freak you out or anything, but you’re the only one who bought a ticket to this.”
I sighed and replied “Are you going to play the movie?”2
There was a moment of silence and then the usher said “Yeah.” and left.
And the film began
The Plot. Gail Daughtry (Zoey Deutch) might be the happiest hairdresser in all of Kansas. She’s two weeks away from marrying her fiancée, Tom (Michael Cassidy) and is super happy for her best friend, Otto (Miles Gutierrez-Riley), a fellow hairdresser, who has just secured tickets to attend a conference in LA hosted by celebrity stylist Remy Fountaine: The King of the Whip Curl (Thomas Lennon).
As Otto packs, he asks Zoey who her Celebrity Sex Pass would be?
Like everyone else, Gail needs that explained, so Otto goes on to define the CSP as the movie star she finds so hot that her spouse should permit her to have sex with him, should the opportunity ever arise.
Gail has never thought about it before, but when pressed by Otto she replies “I don’t know. Jon Hamm, maybe.”
Later that night, Gail decides to ask Tom who his Celebrity Sex Pass would be. Tom does not take the question seriously. Immediately afterwards, the happy couple attend a Jennifer Anniston book signing.
When it’s her turn for the autograph, Gail tells Jennifer Anniston (Jennifer Anniston) that she’s read all her books and she’s even seen some of that TV show Anniston used to be on. Gail also mentions that she’s about to get married to Tom. Moved by Gail’s vulnerability, Anniston makes a point of adding a ‘congratulations’ to her signature.
As they walk towards the exit, Gail remarks how amazing it is that Jennifer Anniston is even nicer in person than she is on TV. Tom tells Gail to meet him by the car. He thinks he forgot his jacket back in the bookstore.
Gail waits by the car.
Time goes by, minutes become hours, when Gail notices the book store closing up for the night, she knocks on the door and asks the clerk if he knows where Tom went.
He does.
He takes Gail to the stock room where Tom and Jennifer Anniston are engaged in coitus.
Tom says “I thought you said this was okay?”
So Gail winds up following Otto to LA and her whimsical thought of bedding Jon Hamm becomes a crusade. A crusade John Slattery winds up assisting with because he’s fallen on hard times and needs the work.
I realize I am not accurately conveying just how funny this movie is. One of the reasons I prefer to review horror movies over comedy is that we are currently in an era where the scary movies are way more interesting than the funny ones.
It doesn’t mean very much to say that Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass is the funniest movie of the year so far. Compared to what? Sheep Detectives? Scary Movie?
But it does mean something to say that Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass is one of the most terrifying films of 2026. I realize just how loaded a statement that is in the year of Obsession, Leviticus, Hokum, Backrooms and Send Help.
This is a movie that reveals the true horror of aging.
It will surprise no one that Jon Hamm is in this movie and that he looks pretty old. Anyone who has spent any time watching big screen movies over the last ten years has also spent time watching Jon Hamm age in all those ‘Skip the Dishes’ commercials that play before the trailers.
The first shock comes from seeing Jennifer Anniston who, don’t get me wrong, is stunningly beautiful in this film, but there’s a maturity to that beauty I don’t recall seeing before. It’s alarmingly apparent that she is significantly older than Gail and Tom. I do not remember any movie prior to this one where Anniston didn’t seem as youthful as she was on that 90s show she used to be on3.
It gets even scarier when Weird Al Yankovic shows up. It was only four years ago that I was noting how incredibly ageless he seemed in Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, there were times in that movie where he could’ve passed for Daniel Radcliffe.
But in Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass, Yankovic looks so… jowly. Remember, this was the guy who once needed exactly 30-seconds to beat John Cusack and Tim Robbins senseless in Tapeheads. In GDATCSP he needs to brandish an AK47 to scare people off his lawn and don’t even get me started on what Penn Jillette looks like in this film. When he first appeared, I thought he was Richard Dreyfus!
Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass suggests it’s possible that aging might not be something only experienced by celebrities. I mean…..maybe even…. me…
No.
No.
That way, madness lies.
Besides, there are other scary parts to Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass. Zoey Deutch4 has extraordinary comic timing and energy. She makes Gail Daughtry loveable and believable despite the movie’s hard-absurd tone.
But she can also be terrifying. Towards the end of this film, she participates in a scene of shocking violence and gore. It’s meant to be funny because it’s such an extreme contrast to everything that has happened in this movie up to that point5 but in terms of savagery and blood lust, it’s worse than anything you’ll see in Evil Dead Burn.
So, in conclusion, Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass is a really funny movie.6 But also a sobering reminder of fleeting time, mortality and how funny situations can turn violent in an instant.
The tea: Green tea is said to reduce aging. Perhaps the time has come to stop drinking anything else.
The snack: Blueberries. You know who doesn’t look old? Marisa Tomei. Blueberries are the only thing she eats.
But I’m currently on Day 6 of the “12-days-No-Odyssesy” challenge where I spend twelve consecutive days at multiplexes watching anything that isn’t Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey. It’s proving to be more difficult than I expected. I might wind up having to watch that Minions movie.
I might have come off more rudely than intended.
I looked it up, it was called The Edge.
Zoey Deutch is Lea Thompson’s daughter! How old does that make you feel?
Well, except maybe for Joe Lo Truglio almost drowning in minestrone and later getting his face kicked off. He looks a lot older too, by the way.
I didn’t even have time to mention how funny Ben Wang, Sabrina Impacciatore and Ken Marino (who also co-wrote the movie) are
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