POCKETFUL OF IRREVERENCE: A MICHAEL STUHLBARG SAGA

he first time we see Michael Stuhlbarg in , he’s smiling broadly, slightly inebriated, and wearing a laurel wreath. To the ancient Greeks, these ornate headdresses were a symbol of strength and virility; the Romans used them to decorate commanders following a successful military campaign, garlands for great men. It’s with some irony, then, that Stuhlbarg should be adorned with one here – its glorious connotations belie the seedy nature of his character, the prominent literary critic Stanley Hyman, whose tumultuous relationship with Shirley Jackson is the subject of Josephine Decker’s sublime fifth feature. Though as Stuhlbarg explains, the real-life Stanley – and the task of playing him — was far more complicated than even the film suggests.