‘King of Staten Island’ stars Pete Davidson as himself: Review

In retrospect, it was probably just a matter of time before Judd Apatow and Pete Davidson found each other.

Apatow is arguably our culture’s preeminent chronicler of grown-ups who haven’t quite grown up, thanks to films like The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up, and Trainwreck; Davidson has literally made a career of being the “resident young person” on Saturday Night Live. Of course they made a movie together, and of course it’s about an immature dude who can’t seem to get his shit together.

But built into the man-child narrative is the expectation that he at least try to start to mature, just a little bit, sooner or later, lest he become a sad cautionary tale. In The King of Staten Island, both Davidson and Apatow try their best to evolve, with uneven but entertaining results. 

Written by Apatow, Davidson, and Dave Sirius, the dramedy is so obviously inspired by Davidson’s own life that knowing basic biographical information about him can make the story more confusing. I spent a large portion of the film wondering why Davidson’s Scott would hide that his dad died in 9/11, only to realize that he wasn’t — The King of Staten Island, perhaps realizing that invoking 9/11 would overwhelm an otherwise low-key tale, has Scott’s dad dying in a regular house fire instead.

The King of Staten Island is most intriguing when it acknowledges the darkness eating away at the edges of Scott’s human-shrug-emoji persona. 

Even those who know nothing about Davidson, however, will likely recognize Scott as someone they’ve known, or been, or maybe still are: an amiable but aimless 20something, waiting around in his childhood bedroom for either life or death to come get him. While he has aspirations of becoming a tattoo artist, he spends his days with the same lousy gang from high school, hanging out in the same lousy basement, doing the same lousy drugs and watching the same lousy films.

The King of Staten Island is most intriguing when it acknowledges the darkness eating away at the edges of Scott’s human-shrug-emoji persona. The film opens with Scott screwing his eyes shut while driving down a busy road, daring the universe to do its worst. He talks frankly about his physical and mental health issues, and deflects real grief with irreverent jokes. (Admittedly, “Knock knock” / “Who’s there?” / “Not your dad!” made me laugh a lot.) When he tells his hookup buddy (Bel Powley) she deserves better than him, it’s half a dirtbag line, half a sincere expression of low self-esteem. 

In those moments, The King of Staten Island feels like progress for Apatow, a willingness to dig deeper into the slacker archetype he knows so well. But although the film is serious about Scott’s emotional journey — this is less a comedy than a drama, albeit one with some solid jokes — it turns timid when it reaches his more jagged edges, sanding them down to make Scott’s story fit into the more standard mold of a layabout who just needed to meet the right person to turn his life around. Just when you wonder if Apatow might have his eye on a bigger challenge, he steps back to tackle a smaller, more familiar one.

Image: Universal Pictures

For Davidson, on the other hand, The King of Staten Island feels like a showcase of potential. Davidson’s skill as an actor is good, not great; there are moments when he seems too in his own head to sell the explosive emotions Scott is expressing. What he does have is a personality original enough to make him seem both irreplaceable and irresistible. No matter how off-putting or obnoxious Scott acts, Davidson remains fascinating to watch.

And Scott can get pretty shitty. The relationship at the heart of The King of Staten Island is an antagonistic one, as Scott and his mother’s new boyfriend, Ray (Bill Burr) alternately try to tolerate each other and push each other out. Chief among Ray’s sins, to Scott, is the fact that he’s a firefighter like Scott’s own late father. You don’t need to be a therapist to see how that’s bound to stir up some intense feelings in a young man who’s spent most of his life avoiding them.

Apatow’s never been one to resist the scenic route, so the film takes its time getting there — 137 minutes of it, in fact. Ray doesn’t even appear until about half an hour in, and once he does, it takes another hour or so for the conflict between him and Scott to boil over. In between, we drift through episodes with Scott’s idiot friends, his disapproving sister (Maude Apatow), and his boring job, some more essential than others.

Thankfully, the final destination is worth the wait. The last stretch of the movie is its sharpest and most bittersweet, as Scott starts to reckon with the man his dad really was, and the man he himself wants to be. Who that man is, we’re left to guess; The King of Staten Island is too clear-eyed to offer up a fairy tale ending for Scott or anyone else. But as Scott steps into the light, squinting at the sky, it feels, finally, like this kid is going to be all right.

The King of Staten Island is available on VOD now.