The Family Stoneis a whole lot more than just spilled egg platters, holiday cheer, and excessive throat clearing à laSarah Jessica Parker. The holiday movie’s stacked cast and collective funniness might’ve been its initial hook, but Sarah Jessica Parker’s uptight character Meredith Morton really seals the deal in this holiday rom-com.Well, and the throat clearing doesn’t hurt either.
We first meet Meredith at the beginning ofThe Family Stoneand our interaction with her isn’t much unlike the one she has with the Stones after first stepping into their house for the holidays. Within the first two minutes of the movie, we watch on as Meredith—sporting an elegant, black ensemble and the tightest bun in modern history—talks very seriously and manically on the phone while her much calmer boyfriend, Everett Stone (Dermot Mulroney), buys a present for his sister at a department store. It might’ve only taken those two minutes to convince us that Meredith was the worst person in the world, but the slow burn of her redemption story is at the real heart of this film.
The Family Stone
An uptight, conservative businesswoman accompanies her boyfriend to his eccentric and outgoing family’s annual Christmas celebration and finds that she’s a fish out of water in their free-spirited way of life.
‘The Family Stone’s Meredith Morton Actually Isn’t the Movie’s Villain
Sarah Jessica Parker embraces Meredith’s slow burn throughoutThe Family Stone’s duration. It takes a talented actor to perfect the art of being a hated character, but an even more talented one to expose us to the other side of being someone who’s hated: frustration. And when Everett stops defending Meredith, she calls him right out on it. “I can see you beginning to look at me like they do,” Meredith says. “You’re telling me, you’re not wondering why you brought me here—that you’re not beginning to have doubts, that you don’t wish I were different?”
It’s that frustration and desire to be accepted that connects us with Meredith because, at one time or another, almost all of us have felt that sinking feeling we just don’t belong. As Meredith, Sarah Jessica Parker transforms that frustration into passion: she was going to get this family to see her for who she really was—and she does.
Luke Wilson’s Character Brings Out the Best in Sarah Jessica Parker
The thing is, without Everett’s brother, Ben Stone (Luke Wilson), we might not have ever seen the softer side of Meredith that was being locked away inside the basement of her characer. Unlike other rom-coms that rely on the love-at-first-sight trope, the chemistry between Ben and Meredith doesn’t take off right away inThe Family Stone.Well, it did for Ben, but it took anaccidental homophobic rant, a minor car crash, and a few beers for Meredith to realize that Ben is the only one who really sees her for who she is.
How Does Sarah Jessica Parker’s Meredith Morton Compare to Carrie Bradshaw?
The Family Stonemight’ve premiered just afterSex and the Cityhad finished its historic run on HBO, but the two characters that Sarah Jessica Parker portrays in those projects were basically on different sides of the universe. In many ways, Meredith is the Bizarro to Carrie’s Superman: Meredith is tightly wound when it comes to her feelings, demeanor, and wardrobe, while Carrie wears her heart on her sleeve and wouldn’t be caught dead in a bun. To come out of playing a beloved character for six seasons and immediately pivot to a character who basically represented everything thatCarrie Bradshawstood against was no easy feat. If you didn’t know that Sarah Jessica Parker had been onSex and the Cityplaying this more expressive, creative, go-with-the-flow character for all that time, it wouldn’t have even mattered—that’s how seamlessly SJP took on the character of Meredith Morton.
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The funny thing is,Iwas the person who didn’t know anything about Sarah Jessica Parker beforeThe Family Stone—that’s the first thing I ever saw her in. Granted, I was only nine whenThe Family Stonecame out and wasn’t allowed to watchSex and the Cityjust yet, but for a while, all I knew of SJP was that she played the tense, anxious Meredith Morton in my favorite holiday movie. After I finally binged my way throughSATClater on in high school, it seemed bizarre that Meredith had been my first foray into the world of SJP. At the same time, though, itmade me realize just how dynamic an actor Sarah Jessica Parker is on-screen.
It’s tough tonotbring upSex and the Citywhen you’re talking about Sarah Jessica Parker—there’s a whole section of this very article about Carrie Bradshaw, for God’s sake. In a strange way, it’s a testament to who she is as both an actor and a person: SJP brings a real, beating heart to every single one of her characters. Just as Meredith ended up uniting the Stone family by the end ofThe Family Stone,Sarah Jessica Parker is almost always the missing puzzle pieceto every project she’s cast in.
The Family Stoneis available to stream on Hulu in the U.S.
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