Michael Morris’ feature directorial debut, To Leslie, from a screenplay by Ryan Binaco, stars Andrea Riseborough as Leslie Rowland, a single mother who turns to alcoholism after using up all the prize money she received after winning the lottery.
She soon finds the chance to turn her life around when a motel owner offers her a job. Allison Janney, Marc Maron, Andre Royo, Owen Teague, and Stephen Root are featured in supporting roles.
To Leslie premiered at South by Southwest on March 12, 2022 and was given limited release on October 7, 2022 by Momentum Pictures.
The film received critical acclaim with Riseborough’s performance garnering widespread praise and Best Actress Oscar nomination.
Leslie is a troubled and manipulative alcoholic from West Texas who won $190,000 in a local lottery, only to squander the winnings on liquor and drugs. Six years later, Leslie is destitute, living a peripatetic life in motels and on the streets. After being kicked out of a residential motel, she reunites with her estranged 20-year-old son James, who allows her to live with him under the provision that she not drink. Leslie soon steals money from James’s roommate Darren, and James discovers liquor bottles under her bed, leading him to call his grandmother and Leslie’s friend Nancy for help.
Nancy and her boyfriend Dutch reluctantly allow Leslie to stay with them, but lock her out in the middle of the night when she visits the local bar and is spotted by Pete, one of their friends. Leslie sleeps outside next to a motel, where she is found at dawn by Sweeney, one of the proprietors.
He orders her to leave, and she flees, leaving her suitcase behind. She is met outside a convenience store that night by Pete, who buys her food, but Leslie again flees when he attempts to make sexual advances toward her.
Leslie returns to the motel in search of her suitcase, and the benevolent Sweeney impulsively offers her a job cleaning rooms in exchange for a small wage and boarding. Royal, who helps run the motel with Sweeney, is cold toward Leslie, whom he has known since childhood. Leslie is frequently unpunctual to her duties, and she continues to spend her earnings on alcohol, often going to bars.
Late one night, Leslie drunkenly wanders to the home where she raised James, startling the family who now lives there. The homeowners phone Sweeney, who returns Leslie to the roadhouse.
Sweeney intends to fire her, but he relents when she assures him she intends to change her ways. With nowhere left to turn, Leslie attempts to focus on her job and maintain sobriety as she suffers through alcohol withdrawal. Leslie and Sweeney develop a friendship, bonding over their mutual history of addiction. Leslie accompanies Sweeney to a fair, where he meets with his daughter and granddaughter. Leslie gets into a confrontation with Nancy at the fair, who lambasts her in front of Sweeney for having abandoned James when he was a child.
Leslie quits her job at the motel, and visits a bar, where she converses with a young man. She orders a beer, but decides not to drink it.
Leslie squats in an abandoned ice cream shop across the street from the motel and watches as Sweeney returns. In the morning, she tells Sweeney that she wants to renovate the ice cream shop.
Ten months later, Leslie is sober. With Sweeney and Royal’s help, she has renovated the ice cream shop, now turned into a diner.
On the opening day, Leslie receives no customers. Nancy arrives that evening at closing time, and Leslie accuses her of sabotaging the business’s opening by telling the locals not to go.
Instead of meeting Leslie with rage, Nancy apologizes for not being present throughout her life. Nancy surprises Leslie by bringing James with her.
The film is a deceptively simple yet heart-wrenching character study, anchored a spectacular performance from Riseborough, who doesn’t hold back yet steers clear from flamboyance.
Cast
Andrea Riseborough as Leslie “Lee” Rowlands
Allison Janney as Nancy
Marc Maron as Sweeney
Andre Royo as Royal
Owen Teague as James
Stephen Root as Dutch
James Landry Hebert as Pete
Catfish Jean as Darren
Scott Subiono as Rancher Glen
