My Criterion Challenge 2026 Challenge Category #50: Criterion Double Features: Film #2
TLDR: Funny Lady is better than Funny Girl. I'm saying it. I'm cementing it. And I won't stop until the rest of the world sees the light. This is my new crusade. Join me if you're brave enough.
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Okay, I feel like I'm being Punk'd. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. I feel like the world has conspired to play a practical joke on me. You see, Funny Girl (1968) sits at a 4.0 and 7.4 on Letterboxd and IMDb, respectively. Funny Lady ( 1975) sits at a 3.0 and 6.2 on Letterboxd and IMDb, respectively.
Now, will someone PLEASE explain to me how that is, because Funny Lady is MILES better than Funny Girl. Weird world we live in when that's a hot take, if I'm being honest. Not only is it miles better, but it makes Funny Girl a better movie, as an extension of the Fanny Brice story. Nearly all of the issues I had with Funny Girl are course-corrected here in this sequel, seven years after the original. First, we have a story about Fanny that features a romance, but remains Fanny's story. James Caan (who I'll have a lot to say about) serves as a true supporting player in this film, bursting in to steal a scene or two, but largely remaining a character in Fanny's story--unlike Nicky in Funny Girl.
The music, while still lacking in the memorability department--mainly due to the style of song choice and lack of jaunty melody and so forth--still stands out in the moment in a big way. Streisand didn't really do it for me in FG, but here I'm seeing the magic. I'm seeing why Fanny Brice was this undeniable figure, which was a feeling that was absent in FG. But even the staging and choreography get more time to shine here. Numbers like (It's Gonna Be A) Great Day or "I Found a Million Dollar Baby (in a Five and Ten Cent Store)" or "Clap Hands! Here Comes Charlie" (performed like a madman by Ben Vereen) are all dazzling to watch in the same way all the best movie musicals are. They're colorful. They mix song, dance, camera choreography, bold colors, and lighting to make an experience come alive (thanks to the wonderful cinematography from James Wong Howe, who came out of retirement to shoot this, his final film). And even subtler ones like Barbara singing How Lucky Can You Get alone on a stage feel so intentionally done that it's hard to look away from. I found this whole film very difficult to look away from.
The humor and liveliness are here in a big way, mostly due to the electric chemistry between Fanny and Billy. The decision to showcase their evolution from strangers to butting-heads collaborators to Fanny at her wits' end with him to true collaborators to a flawed married couple to a doomed long-distance romance was, I thought, brilliant.
It makes this musical feel more lived-in and human than its predecessor. In the years that followed the original, not only did performance styles evolve, but the movie-musical evolved. And you can clearly see it, watching these two films back to back. Funny Lady, I see, as a film comprising the pre-60s saturated theatricality of the classic movie musical with a more grounded, murky, morally complex, and human texture of the 1970s. It very much feels like a musical made post-Cabaret. Streisand is dynamite in this, and it's crazy to me that she won Best Actress for FG and was left off the nominations for this one. I can list SEVERAL scenes in this that I would consider Oscar-worthy; her seeing Nicky again in her dressing room all the way through the song How Lucky Can You Get (a complete reimagining of that song) is some masterful work, the scene of her and Nicky near the end (her toothbrush monologue) was also heartfelt and beautiful, the scene of her and Billy at the train station, etcetera. Too many to name here. I felt Fanny in this far more than I did in Funny Girl, and maybe it's because she becomes a legacy character by virtue of being in two films, and so you can grow with her a bit (even though I watched these a couple of days apart).
And that leads me to my other gripe about FG, which was the fact that I frankly didn't buy the romance between Fanny and Nicky.
Here? You bet your ass I buy Fanny and Billy. I have to give major props to James Caan. He brilliantly dances the many lines between an arrogant hustler, a charming womanizer, a nervous young man, and a flawed husband. One minute, you kinda hate him (with the same smirk as Fanny when she realized "okay, he's kinda cute"), the next your pissed off at Fanny for being so obessed with Nicky, and then youre swooning over his plea to be "really married" to Fanny, and then you want to smack him for what he does, only you quickly forgive him, or at the very least understand his decision.
The scene in Billy's bedroom with Fanny after she surprises him at the Aquacade sequence is truly one of those "why don't more people talk about this" scenes that makes me look around at the overwhelming LACK of love for this film with puzzled confusion. (I have to type this out myself, because apparently no one bothered to post it online anywhere, so enjoy.)
BILLY: "You performed for me tonight."
FANNY: "What? I performed for you?"
BILLY: "Well, I know you. I know how you think. When you want something, the best way to go about getting it is to be funny. I've seen you do that before."
FANNY: "Oh yeah?"
BILLY: "Yeah. You went through a lot of trouble to make me laugh tonight."
FANNY: "Well, you've got a very primitive sense of humor..."
(a pause. Billy thinks.)
BILLY: "You know, I got a terrific idea. I mean, I don't know if it would work, but I wanted to see what you think."
FANNY: "What's on your mind, kid?"
BILLY: "Why don't we get married?"
FANNY: "We got married."
BILLY: "No, I mean really be married. Really married."
FANNY: (sigh) "Mrs. Rose is the name, chicken soup is the game. Is that what you want?"
BILLY: "What I want is... I want you to do more of what you did tonight. Brush off a broad if you think she's getting too close. You remember a long time ago, you made me say 'I need you'? That's what I want. I want you to need me. I mean, really need me... Need me. (a long pause as he admires Fanny) You got some sexy ears, honey. I think I'll stick diamonds in 'em."
FANNY: (leans into his chest) "I need you. I need you. I need you."
Seeing it written out doesn't do it justice, I know. But truly, that scene felt like old-school movie magic. I was locked in. Two performers in a room, some dazzling dialogue, motives shifting, emotions morphing, a slow push-in on a two-shot at the end. Dazzling, I tell you! If I were a teacher, I'd use that scene as a lesson.
In fact, even in the end, after Fanny comes to realize she's done with Nicky forever and runs back home to Billy, only to find him in bed with another woman, the film still feels like it's evolving alongside you, and then it asks you to look back and reevaluate what you'd seen up to that point. When she offers to forget the whole thing, to negotiate, and Billy, with his head down, says, "To her, I'm Nick..." it's devastating.
And its devestating in a way that Funny Girl's ending isn't. FG's ending feels like it's Nick's problem that drives them apart, because Nick is such a large figure in that story. Here, we're made certain that this is still Fanny's story. Their relationship failing is because of Fanny's hang-up with her ex-husband throughout the film. Billy truly wanted the love that Fanny showed for Nick, but he simply never got it. And when Fanny finally finds that love, after reckoning with her feelings for Nick, and rushing home, she discovers that it was too late. That sometimes in life, you learn the lesson too late.
Going back and rewatching some scenes from this, I'm sucked in all over again. I'm charmed, I'm moved, and I'm bursting with energy to sing its praises from the rooftops.
That being said, some quick gripes. The film loses steam in the back half. It abandons the song and dance energy in favor of the relationship drama, much like the original, only this time it's more emotionally nuanced and interesting. The musical numbers, as I said, could have some more staying power. The decision to make Fanny the primary focus of the musical numbers still kind of irks me. I'd like some of the supporting players to have some moments to shine. We get some glimpses of James Caan singing, and I think I wanted some duets or something. The film is a touch on the long side, but I rarely felt it.
All of this is to say that I get truly and utterly confused when a film like this enters my orbit--something that I would have otherwise probably never given the time of day. I mean, just look at those numbers (3.0 and 6.2 on Letterboxd and IMDb, respectively). Those are not great numbers, but by my metric, those are incorrect numbers. Those are numbers that lead me to say, declaratively, "World, you got this one wrong. You had a good run at being right about a lot of things, and you should be proud of that. But in this one, tiny area, you got it wrong. It happens to the best of us. It's nothing to be ashamed about. But you're wrong, plain and simple."
This is an example of a film that makes me want to go around and beg people to watch, to go back to, to reevaluate.
And so, Funny Lady is better than Funny Girl. I'm saying it. I'm cementing it. And I won't stop until the rest of the world sees the light. This is my new crusade. Join me if you're brave enough.
7.7/10
