In Admission, Tina Fey and Paul Rudd play opposite each other in a collaboration that's loaded with potential, but their onscreen chemistry falls surprisingly flat. Fey plays Portia, a staunchly by-the-books Princeton admissions officer who gets a call from John (Rudd) to make a routine visit to his alternative school and talk to his students about college. He has an ulterior motive for luring her to the campus in the form of Jeremiah (Nat Wolff), a bright student he believes to be her birth son, but Portia has no idea until she's already immersed in their lives. The angle is far-fetched, but it could work if so many other components weren't jammed into the script.
Though it's billed as a romantic comedy, the romance between John and Portia feels forced and detracts from the story. Their combating dispositions serve as an obvious "opposites attract" romantic mechanism, but it's stale, especially given that Rudd and Fey's dynamic feels more like that of siblings. When they finally — spoiler alert — do get together, there's not much emotional payoff. To find out what else I think about Admission, just read more.
