Derek DelGaudio's In & of Itself

A filmed record of a stage show. Derek DelGaudio does card work, but the show is less about tricks than about identity: a man trying to tell his own story and losing hold of who he is as he tells it. On the way in, each audience member picks a card from a wall; the cards carry identity statements beginning "I am a...". At the end those cards come back, and that is where the film's most talked-about moment happens. Frank Oz directed. Oz had also staged the show: a run planned for ten weeks at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles stretched to seventy-two, and then it moved to New York. The film was shot in a small New York theatre in front of an audience. Stephen Colbert is among the executive producers. It went up on Hulu on 22 January 2021. Who it is for: viewers who like stage magic and one-man storytelling and do not mind being brought to tears. Who it is not for: anyone who wants to know how the tricks work; the film never opens that up. For some viewers the tone tips into taking itself very seriously.