Receiving a rapturous reception at the New York Film Festival earlier this month, Ben Stiller’s Stiller & Meara: Nothing is Lost is an affectionate but clear-eyed portrait of the actor-filmmaker’s late parents, US showbiz royalty Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. Pieced together through performance footage, TV interviews, home movies and long kept correspondence – Jerry Stiller was an inveterate hoarder of professional and personal mementoes – the film also emerges as an insightful look at how the younger Stiller has taken on the passions and foibles of his folks. Here’s some documentary gold from the Stiller family archive.
1. Ben Stiller’s mum is not a Zoolander fan
Stiller may have found fame creating iconic comedic characters such as Derek Zoolander, White Goodman and Gaylord Focker, but his mother Anne Meara never liked the early funny ones instead preferring Stiller’s more serious turns – see Noah Baumbach’s Greenberg. There’s no sense of what she thought of Alex the Lion in the Madagascar movies.
2. Sibling rivalry is an issue for the Stiller family
In a revealing discussion – and typical of the documentary’s openness – Stiller’s older sister Amy opens up about the deep-seated jealousy she felt watching him become successful while she was struggling to break into the industry. To his credit, Stiller as both interviewer and director gives her space to tell her story.
3. Ben Stiller cut his own kid out of a movie
As an example of Ben Stiller’s drive and professionalism inherited from his parents, it transpires that the director cut his own daughter out of his 2013 film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Ella Stiller was supposed to play the younger version of Odessa Mitty, the sister of Stiller’s character Walter. ‘It’s probably the worst decision I ever made in my life,’ he tells her. She takes it well.
4. Jerry Stiller wasn’t always acting in Seinfeld
Jerry Stiller found another level of fame late in life as the irascible George Costanza’s dad Frank in seminal sitcom Seinfeld. Yet the doc makes it clear that to play Frank’s frustrations and inner rage, Stiller Sr. was channelling his own quick-to-anger personality. Frank’s catchphrase ‘Serenity Now!’ couldn’t be more apt.
5. Tropic Thunder wasn’t Ben Stiller’s first disaster movie
Before he became the director of Zoolander and Tropic Thunder, Nothing is Lost uncovers the tiny epics Stiller made as a kid. The best of the bunch is his homespun version of disaster classic Airport ’75 featuring a toy plane and fluffy cotton wool clouds. There is nothing in here to suggest that Stiller would go on to direct must-see TV show Severance.
In select US theaters Oct 17 and streaming on Apple TV+ Oct 24.
