We鈥檝e seen Vanessa Bayer play an innocent friend named Nikki before (in 2015鈥檚 Trainwreck). But this time around, as one of the stars of Netflix鈥檚 rom-com Ibiza, the Saturday Night Live alumna finally shines.
Ibiza, the best-friends-go-on-a-wild-trip comedy now streaming on Netflix, has Bayer鈥檚 Nikki going on an impromptu trip to Spain with her besties Harper (Gillian Jacobs) and Leah (Phoebe Robinson). The movie, which was originally called I鈥檓 in Love With the DJ, has a shallow, circa 2014 plot about Harper neglecting work responsibilities for a hot EDM DJ (Richard Madden). However, the girlfriends鈥� banter and comedic timing, specifically Bayer鈥檚, is more than worth watching.
And it鈥檚 no surprise. On SNL, Bayer was reliably humorous with her impersonations of Jacob the Bar Mitzvah boy and Miley Cyrus. But when it came to combining romance and comedy on the show, she was even better. The 2014 sketch Awkward Flirts had her making uncomfortable, laugh-out-loud conversation with neighbour Kyle Mooney. One of 2017鈥檚 best sketches, a parody of a Totino鈥檚 commercial, had Bayer playing a housewife who has a sexual awakening in the kitchen with Kristen Stewart, in the style of a romantic French film.
And in her small role in Amy Schumer鈥檚 Trainwreck, Bayer got plenty of laughs for her character鈥檚 terrible dating advice and inability to stop smiling.
So letting Bayer be flirty, funny and free for a full feature film makes sense. In Ibiza, she鈥檚 a dentist naive enough to not know what it means to blackmail someone, but bold enough to inadvertently do it. She tries to avoid smoking in groups (last time she did, she 鈥渢ried to convince everyone that Shallow Hal is the best film of our generation鈥�), but isn鈥檛 afraid to party so hard she winds up exercising, high, in a stranger鈥檚 house. The physical comedy in the latter scene is liquid-spewing-out-of-your-nose funny.
Ibiza, much like Tiffany Haddish鈥檚 Girls Trip before it, should be a star-making vehicle for Bayer. Before Haddish deservingly broke out in her 2017 ensemble comedy, her biggest movie role was as a cop in the action comedy Keanu. Today, Haddish has a memoir, TV show, movies and is at the top of many lists to host the Oscars. Bayer should be considered for more than bit parts and TV cameos (she鈥檚 appeared on Love and Will & Grace), too.
On the strength of this performance, casting directors will be asking Bayer to GTD.
That鈥檚 short for 鈥淕imme Them Digits,鈥� as Nikki says in Ibiza: 鈥淚鈥檓 gonna start that.鈥�
