''Tune in Tomorrow'' is a 1990 American

comedy film A comedy film is a category of film which emphasizes humor. These films are designed to make the audience laugh through amusement. Films in this style traditionally have a happy ending (black comedy being an exception). Comedy is one of the ol ...

directed by

Jon Amiel Jon Amiel (born 20 May 1948) is an English director who has worked in film and television in both the UK and the US. After receiving a BAFTA Award nomination for the BBC series ''The Singing Detective'' (1986), he went on to direct films, inclu ...

. It is based on the 1977

Mario Vargas Llosa Jorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa, 1st Marquess of Vargas Llosa (born 28 March 1936), more commonly known as Mario Vargas Llosa (, ), is a Peruvian novelist, journalist, essayist and former politician, who also holds Spanish citizenship. Vargas Ll ...

novel ''

Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter ''Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter'' ( es, La tía Julia y el escribidor) is the seventh novel by Nobel Prize-winning author Mario Vargas Llosa. It was published by Seix Barral, S.A., Spain, in 1977. Plot Set in Peru during the 1950s, it is the ...

'', and was released under that same title in many countries. Relocated from the novel's setting in 1950s-era Lima, Peru to

New Orleans, Louisiana New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

that same decade, it stars Peter Falk, Keanu Reeves and

Barbara Hershey Barbara Lynn Herzstein, better known as Barbara Hershey (born February 5, 1948), is an American actress. In a career spanning more than 50 years, she has played a variety of roles on television and in cinema in several genres, including weste ...

in a story surrounding a

radio drama Radio drama (or audio drama, audio play, radio play, radio theatre, or audio theatre) is a dramatized, purely acoustic performance. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine ...

. The soundtrack for the film was composed by

Wynton Marsalis Wynton Learson Marsalis (born October 18, 1961) is an American trumpeter, composer, teacher, and artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He has promoted classical and jazz music, often to young audiences. Marsalis has won nine Grammy Award ...

, who makes a cameo appearance with various members of his band.

Plot

Martin Loader works at WXBU, the local radio station, where scriptwriter Pedro Carmichael is hired. Pedro, who is known to come up with outrageous storylines that involve people in his real life, becomes a mentor figure to the younger Martin. Martin's Aunt Julia, not related by blood, returns to New Orleans after many years away and Martin falls for her. Once Pedro learns about their romance, he starts incorporating details of it into the script of his daily drama series, called "Kings of the Garden District". Soon, Martin and Julia are not only hearing about their fictional selves over the radio, but they hear about what they are going to do next.

Cast

Production

Principal photography began in Wilmington, North Carolina, on August 15, 1989. Hurricane Hugo damaged the film sets, so the production moved to

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

. Filming was wrapped by November 2. The

soap opera A soap opera, or ''soap'' for short, is a typically long-running radio or television serial, frequently characterized by melodrama, ensemble casts, and sentimentality. The term "soap opera" originated from radio dramas originally being sponsored ...

characters in the radio drama are voiced by the fictional WXBU employees. For instance, the fictional character "Richard Quince" is voiced by Leonard Pando, but is seen by the audience as

Peter Gallagher Peter Killian Gallagher (born August 19, 1955) is an American actor. Since 1980, he has played roles in numerous Hollywood films. He is best known for starring as Sandy Cohen in the television drama series '' The O.C.'' from 2003 to 2007, recu ...

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

the film has an approval rating of 50% based on 12 reviews. Roger Ebert gave the movie 2 and a half stars out of 4, noting that "sometimes we laugh easily, sometimes uncertainly, and sometimes we just look at the screen and wonder why anyone thought that was funny." He added that though "some of the movie's best laughs come when the jaws of the listeners drop open with shock and amazement at some of Falk's more outrageous fantasies", the film's uneven comic tone remains a problem throughout the story.

Desson Thomson Desson Patrick Thomson is a former speechwriter for the Obama administration and former film critic for ''The Washington Post''. He was known as Desson Howe until 2003 when he changed his name after reuniting with his birth father. Biography ...

of ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'' wrote, "The movie spends too much time with the Aunt and not enough with the Scriptwriter." Rita Kempley, also of ''The Washington Post'', was more positive about the film: "A tri-layered tale of love, creative impulses and dial-spinning, it comes and it goes, evocative and a little bit magical, flawed but forgivably so."

References

External links

* * *
Tune in Tomorrow
' at

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tune in Tomorrow 1990 films 1990 comedy films American comedy films Films shot in New Orleans Films set in New Orleans Films shot in North Carolina Films about radio people Radio drama Films set in 1951 Films directed by Jon Amiel 1990s American films Films with screenplays by William Boyd (writer) Films based on works by Mario Vargas Llosa 1990s English-language films