
Boy, it takes more than a few minutes to get one’s mind around the idea that Adam Sandler’s produced and co-stars in a comedy which you simply must use the word “endearing” to describe. “Charming” works its way in, “kind of adorable” also fits “You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah.”
Sure, he employs half his family in this Happy Madison production, a coming-of-age comedy adapted from Fiona Rosenbloom’s Judy Blume-ish novel. He’s no longer employing old comic cronies and sportscaster Dan Patrick. But it’s not like he’s turned over a new leaf.
First-time director Sammi Cohen and her production team give us further proof that Netflix owns the glossy teen movie market with this sparkling snapshot of a traditional rite of passage in an age of aspirational, attention-economy affluence.
Sunny Sandler stars as Stacy Friedman, our teen practicing her “portion” of the Torah, struggling to come up with a Bat Mitzah project and over-planning her “New York” themed coming-out party while indulgent parents Bree (Idina Menzel) and Danny (Adam Sandler) smile and shake their heads.
No, she can’t book a yacht or an Olivia Rodrigo drive-by on a jetski. But at least she has her bestie Lydia (Samantha Lorraine) to help plan and choreograph it, with Stacy producing Lydia’s introduction (life summary) video for Lydia’s “Candyland” bat mitzvah, which precedes hers.
Lydia’s parents (Jackie Sandler and Luis Guzman) are splitting up and “Mom wants to spend all of Dad’s money before the next court date.” But she’s got her bestie to lean on and play their watch-a-sad-video to “see who can cry first” game. And they’ve got Hebrew School.
That’s where “You Are So Not Invited” really sets itself apart. You might as well call this tony academy Borscht Belt Prep, thanks to the all the shticky staff and the “cool rabbi” presiding over all these “cutie-pops.”
“Saturday Night Live’s” Sarah Sherman flat-out steals the movie as Rabbi Rebecca, urging her charges to “do something menschy for your community, for society at large,” with their mitzvah projects, to “practice (chanting) your haftarah” and prep themselves for adulthood, when you “have to take responsibility for your actions” and own your own mistakes.
Rabbi Rebecca sings her lessons as she deflects the big questions from her tween and teen students.
“If God exists, why is there climate change?” “”Why can’t straight people get on gay TikTok?”
“God is so random,” she sings, and the kids sing along. “God is so random!“
Stacy prays “Dear God, it’s Stacy” prayers and tries to get her parents on board her idea for an adult, talked-about and “legendary” party. No bouncy houses or ball pits.
“Oh my GOD, that’s so for kids! I’ve been having my period for over SEVEN months now!”
Dad is all memories of “MY bar mitzvah” in “your grandparents’ basement” — no renting a hall, no hiring that hyped-up “idiot” DJ Schmuley (Ido Mosseri, funny).
“THAT’s why we fought the Nazis? So YOU could have a (virgin) mojito bar?”
But there’s a cute boy, Andy Goldfarb (Dylan Hoffman) in the picture. And the richest, shallowesst mean girls might be mean enough to include one bestie and one bestie only in their mean girl games.
There’s trouble on the horizon among these Chosen Children.



The school is so cool and the houses so high end that when Cohen & Co. treat us to a “Breaking Away” riff, kids gathering at “The Ledge” of the local quarry for their most dangerous entertainment, it’s jarring. Too working class.
The snapshot of this world is richly-detailed, with a year-long parade of bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs, all DJ’d by Schumley, each a more expensive “theme” than the one before, with Stacy stuck at the grandma’s table for one and soaking up a little wisdom, and her bored older sister (Sadie Sandler, of course) and her bestie (Zaara Kuttemperoor) watching “It!” and “Shawshank” on their iPhone rather than joining in the “fun” with the “kids.”
It’s funny and flippant and a tad vulgar when it isn’t being cute. The life lesson and messaging is upbeat and sentimental. Maybe Mr. Middle School Right isn’t even Jewish, he’s just enrolled there. And the little asides have a bit of adult bite to them.
“Don’t worry,” the mean girls — my favorite is named Kym Chang Cohen — purr. “Some of us are straight, too.” Sounds like a suggestion that had Rolling Stone trying to cancel Alice Cooper.
The cast is about as diverse as is possible considering the world depicted here. But you don’t have to be Jewish to “get” most of what’s going on and be on board with the lesson that “adulthood” isn’t just about sexuality, getting and spending money and “looking hot,” and all that. It’s about not hiding behind your youth, making more responsible decisions and owning the irresponsible ones.
And if we’re lucky, there are teachers who will guide us on that path, and parents there to make corrections, even if they aren’t trying to nepo-baby you into the family business.
Rating: PG-13, some profanity, scatalogical humor
Cast: Sunny Sandler, Samantha Lorraine, Idina Menzel, Sarah Sherman, Jackie Sandler, Dylan Hoffman, Luis Guzman and Adam Sandler
Credits: Directed by Sammi Cohen, scripted by Alison Peck, based on a novel by Fiona Rosenbloom. A Netflix release.
Running time: 1:43

