The names Stiller & Meara don't ring many bells with people younger than Boomers or old Gen Xers, but they were a prominent comedy duo akin to Mike Nichols and Elaine May who were their predecessors in the early-1960s before splitting to focus on their own careers as writers and directors (he directed The Graduate, Catch-22, and Working Girl, among others; she wrote Heaven Can Wait and The Birdcage, but also directed notorious flop Ishtar). To most people Jerry Stiller is best known for playing George Costanza's yelling father on Seinfeld and Anne Meara is less-remembered for her role on Archie Bunker's Place, the sequel/spin-off of All in the Family.
But their best known co-production is their younger child, Ben Stiller, and he memorializes his parents and indulges in a family therapy session on our time with the Apple TV+ original documentary Stiller & Meara: Nothing is Lost. Filmed in the wake of Stiller's death in 2020 (Meara passed in 2015), Ben and his sister Anne are sifting through their parent's Upper West Side apartment in preparation of selling. (Bought in 1953 for $11,000, it sold in 2021 for $5.9 million.) Because the elder Stiller seemingly tape-recorded everything from routine rehearsals to conversations along with filming Super 8 home movies, there is copious candid insight material available along with the dozens of Ed Sullivan Show and talk show clips.
Unfortunately for those seeking a thorough documentary of the couple, son Ben uses the project to also work out his personal issues with his life growing up in a home where it wasn't clear if Mom & Dad were yelling at each other because they were working out a routine or arguing and how he almost almost wrecked his marriage to Christine Taylor because he was spending so much time working and being away from his family including a son and daughter, same as his parents had done.
While it's nice that the Fauci Flu Scamdemic helped repair his marriage and he and his sister were able to process their parents lives, it comes at the expense of us outsiders who don't really care. He doesn't make clear when certain events are happening or brings up something like Meara's alcoholism becoming an issue, but then letting it drop until she finally gets sober much later in life after making it seem she'd dried out earlier.
While Stiller & Meara: Nothing is Lost manages to get some of the parents story across, if feels like more could've been included if Ben had remembered this wasn't about him.
Like all Apple TV+ originals, it's presented in 4K Dolby Vision and Atmos audio, but neither are really noticeable and these sorts of content (documentaries) don't require it.
Score: 6/10. Catch it on Apple TV+.
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