At the world premiere for You, Me & Tuscany in New York City, the room—full of Black industry professionals, journalists, and influencers—was abuzz with a specific type of pride. Universal’s new original romantic comedy, starring musician and actress Halle Bailey and Bridgerton’s Regé-Jean Page, was already facing an uphill battle before its release. A few weeks earlier, Black filmmaker Nina Lee explained in a series of X posts that studios are holding off on buying her already shot rom-com until You, Me & Tuscany proves successful at the box office. Her now-viral posts revealed just how much seems to be at stake with this one rom-com, placing a lot of pressure on its 105 minutes. Before the screening began, producer Will Packer gave a speech about how proud he was to present this movie, considering it had been hard to both sell and market in an era in which studio execs believe “no one watches rom-coms anymore.” The heavy burden feels especially unfair because it’s a Black rom-com, as Bailey expressed when discussing Lee’s tweets in an interview. Why does one Black film have to set the standard for all aspiring Black filmmakers? Was the smashing success of Anyone but You not enough to prove that romantic comedies are still profitable?
Luckily for all of us, You, Me & Tuscany carries the burden well, offering a delightful moviegoing experience that proves that rom-coms, no matter how big or small, do belong in theaters.
You, Me & Tuscany hits all of the benchmarks you would expect of a romantic romp. The movie, written by Ryan Engle and directed by Kat Coiro, follows a young woman named Anna (Bailey), who impulsively runs away from her stagnant life in New York to vacation in Tuscany. She manages to stay there for free by sneaking into a villa belonging to a man, Matteo (Lorenzo de Moor), whom she met for one night in New York City, and convincing his family that she’s his fiancée. However, trouble starts to find her at the same time as love, when she finds herself falling for Matteo’s cousin, Michael (Page).
The chemistry between Bailey and Page isn’t going to spark any off-screen dating rumors, if we’re being honest, but it’s certainly sound enough to carry the film. Their romance is founded upon one classic trope, a rude introduction that blossoms into love, and complicated by another, a fake-dating scheme. The way it plays out is fairly conventional, but totally satisfying. And there are a series of great moments involving a hit early-2000s song (which I won’t spoil here) that lead to a romantic gesture in the end.
Outside of the main story, one of the best parts of the movie—the aspect that most gives it that early-2000s comedy vibe—is that it’s bursting at the seams with lovable, funny side characters. Anna’s best friend from home, Claire (Aziza Scott), is the hilarious sassy best friend who won’t hesitate to give you a dose of real advice. While in Tuscany, Anna befriends Lorenzo (Marco Calvani), a cab driver who is always eating and becomes something of her emotional support Italian fairy godfather. There are a number of other smaller characters, like Matteo’s vlogger nephew and Matteo’s sister who is way too candid (and blasé) about her ongoing affair, that give endless color to what feels like a fantasy.
A fantasy is just what You, Me & Tuscany looks like, too. Depending on who you ask, rom-coms require different elements to really be considered a good entry into the canon. For me, chief among the critical parts is not just an aspect of desirability in the central relationship, but also in the setting. You, Me & Tuscany absolutely nails this requirement, even if it is all cloaked in lighting reminiscent of common Netflix fare. The story unfolds on the family’s beautiful Tuscan vineyard, and given Anna’s background as a chef, it creates a number of opportunities for love to blossom over vino and pasta. Simply put: Don’t show up to your screening hungry.
But what truly makes You, Me & Tuscany feel so in line with the classic zany rom-coms of yore is how delightfully detached from reality it is, and how predictable its beats are. Anna first enchants Matteo at the bar with her overly complicated burger order (a classic rom-com way of positioning the female lead as different from other girls), she wakes up with a full face of makeup on, and she sneaks into Matteo’s villa and convinces his family that she’s an impending new addition to their group with a truly shocking ease that requires suspension of all disbelief. Lorenzo asks questions no cab driver would likely ever ask a passenger they just met, like whether or not she’s happy. But that’s part of the charm: Anticipating these plot points, while still being delighted when they happen, is what rom-coms are all about, which is something my theater’s audience definitely understood. In the movie’s first few minutes, when Matteo first meets Anna at his hotel bar, she says she’s not staying at that hotel. His inviting response—“Would you like to?”—prompted a wave of squeals and ooh-ing from my fellow viewers that set the tone for an openly vocal crowd response to the rest of the film. We laughed out loud, gasped, and cheered at all of the big moments, like when Anna and Michael get caught in a downpour of sorts, when they have their first kiss, and when a former flame appears.
If the growing mainstream popularity of romance over the past few years says anything, it’s that we, the people, aren’t necessarily yearning for the mold to be broken all the time. We like the mold! Not every rom-com has to be the best, most groundbreaking one we’ve ever seen to be worth the cost of admission. They can’t all be When Harry Met Sally—and nor should they be! Sometimes, we just want to see filmmakers making fuzzy, feel-good stories about family and love defying the odds, especially when they’re adorned with a cast of kooky characters and an aughts-style blooper reel (remember those?) at the end. If that’s what you’re looking for, You, Me & Tuscany has it in spades. It’s delightful, it’s easy, it’s fun, and when we were walking out of the theater, all of my friends and I relaxed our shoulders a little bit and agreed on one thing: We needed that.