The Christophers (2025)

Julian Sklar, once a giant of the London art scene, now pays his bills recording Cameo videos for fans, and that’s the saddest, funniest detail in The Christophers. Anyone expecting a twisty Steven Soderbergh caper should know there’s barely any caper in it, and the scheming kids, James Corden’s Barnaby and Jessica Gunning’s Sallie, are thin as a gallery flyer. It doesn’t matter. Michaela Coel plays Lori, a gifted painter who quit showing her work, hired to pose as Julian’s assistant and secretly finish his abandoned third series of portraits. When he orders her to shred the unfinished canvases, she forges copies and shreds those instead. Ian McKellen is vain, needling, fragile and funny, and Coel meets him with total calm, so every scene plays like chess. Ed Solomon’s script is full of poison-tipped lines. It holds a 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. An 8.4 because two great actors turn a small story into a sparring match you never want to end. $4,058 says you eye your closet’s unfinished project tonight and wonder who you could hire to finish it.

What works: McKellen and Coel are a superb double act, and Ed Solomon’s script is sharp, funny and surprisingly tender about getting old.

What doesn’t: Barnaby and Sallie are one-note schemers, and anyone expecting a twisty Soderbergh heist will find there’s no real twist coming.

Who it’s for: Fans of sharp two-hander dramas and anyone who has wondered what an artist’s legacy is really worth.