In Awkwafina’s new Prime Video comedy Jackpot, she plays a young woman who wins a newly established lottery in California, the winnings of which come with a hair-raising catch: In order to hang on to the cash prize, the lottery recipient has to survive an onslaught of jackpot hunters trying to track down and kill winner. And, in so doing, those hunters get to keep the prize they steal. In other words, it’s sort of The Hunger Games meets Publishers Clearing House.
It’s a sort of wacky premise for a movie, obviously, and it’s made all the more so by John Cena playing amateur lottery protection agent Noel Cassidy, whose job is to protect Awkwafina’s Katie Kim until sundown in exchange for a piece of the lottery prize. Simu Liu is also on hand as Cassidy’s rival Louis Lewis, who’s also angling for a piece of Katie’s prize. And that’s pretty much it. An unserious, action-oriented romp.
Directed by Paul Feig, Jackpot is currently the #1 title on Prime Video, ahead of even The Boys. “We from the very beginning have thought this could be an international franchise,” Feig said in an interview with ComicBook, hinting that more could be in the works. “It would be fun to see what other countries do with their own lottery.”
The screenplay for Jackpot was written by veteran videogame writer and designer Rob Yescombe, who poured into the script the kind of action and physical comedy that Feig has often proclaimed his love of. “For me, creating truly high stakes for the characters makes comedy funnier,” Feig explains in production notes that accompany the movie. “The best comedy has danger in it.
“For a modern audience, and I include myself in that, you need momentum. You have to invest in and care about the characters. This script had all that from the beginning. Plus, I knew I would get to do a lot of funny stunts. When I was a kid I dreamed about becoming a stuntman, so now I’m living that vicariously.”
Of course, as is de rigeur for big streaming movies at this point, the reviews for Jackpot have been … not kind. On Rotten Tomatoes, it currently has a pretty terrible 33% critics’ score and a nearly as bad 49% audience score. Streaming has made it so much easier for mid movies to find an audience these days.
