People have mixed emotions about class reunions, looking forward to seeing long-lost pals and fretting over running into the kid who bullied you or a former sweetheart. But then there are those events where you are reunited with the buds who held it down for you and helped shaped the adult you became.
That’s the premise behind the Chris Rock and Adam Sandler collaboration, “Grown Ups,” which debuts in theaters Friday, June 25.
Rock, Sandler, Kevin James, David Spade, and Rob Schneider are five friends and former teammates who reunite years later to honor the passing of their childhood basketball coach. They bring their wives (played by Salma Hayek, Maria Bello and Maya Rudolph) and children along to spend the Fourth of July weekend at the lake house where they celebrated their championship years earlier and discover how they’ve grown and changed – for better or worse.
Think a comedic version of “That Championship Season” or any number of reunion films (“The Best Man,” “Why Did I Get Married?”) that seem to provide a perfect setting for exploring coming of age – any age: youth, middle-age, senior citizen – issues.
Cherrel Wilson Christian said she was so nervous when she prepared to meet her former eighth grade Catholic school classmates that she asked her husband if she looked 30 years older to him.
“Thirty years older than what?” he replied.
She needn’t have worried. Everyone looked pretty much the same and were so happy to see each other, as they began to reminisce people slipped into their old habits, and by night’s end, the kids who hung together back in the day were standing together talking as if nothing had happened.
David L. Clark had a different experience.
When a group of his buddies from the Soundview Projects in the south central Bronx got together and planned a reunion, Clark packed up his wife and kids and drove up from Silver Spring, Md., eager to show them his old neighborhood, where he played hoops with dreams of being an NBA star, showing off his skills in navigating a tough neighborhood where he was then known as “Turk.”
When he got there, however, the neighborhood, and Clark, had changed.
“It was rougher than I imagined. I was gonna get out of the car and walk around with the kids,” said the IT manager. “I changed my mind and just drove them around instead. I acted like it was too rough for them, but the truth was it was too rough for me. I’m a different guy now.”
