This review of “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande” was first published on January 22 after the film’s Sundance premiere.
The Sundance entry “Good Luck to You, Leo Grande” may well be sparking awards chatter for 2023 over Emma Thompson’s marvelous turn as Nancy Stokes, a widowed, retired secondary-school religious-education teacher who decides to hire the titular escort, played by Daryl McCormack (“The Wheel of Time”).
The script by comedian Katy Brand is essentially a two-hander that takes place almost entirely inside a single hotel room, and could be easily reimagined as a West End play. But the cast and crew — led by Australian filmmaker Sophie Hyde, who brought “52 Tuesdays” and “Animals” to Sundance in 2014 and 2019, respectively — have put so much care into making the most within the piece’s limited confines that one could hardly deride the final product as stagy.