Fair Play: When the New Boss is Your Secret Workplace Lover, Things Get Sticky Fast

By Karen Gordon

Rating: A-

If everything is fair in love and war, buckle your seatbelts. Aided by a superb cast, writer-director Chloe Domont makes a strong feature debut with Fair Play, a deft drama about gender dynamics in intimate relationships and in the workplace.

Emily (Phoebe Dynevor, Bridgerton) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich, Oppenheimer) make a picture-perfect couple. They’re gorgeous, confident, mad about each other, at a peak of sexiness and happiness. Luke proposes marriage in an old-fashioned way for a modern guy, but totally charming. Hell, I just met them, and I was happy for them.

There are glitches though. They are both analysts at a hedge fund company that forbids relationships between employees. So far, they’ve managed to keep their relationship — and the fact that they cohabitate — a secret. They also work their schedules to keep their lives in sync. They know they’ll have to adapt eventually, but that’s for another day.

Hedge fund is, of course, movie speak for “pressure cooker work environment.” And that is underlined very early on when the portfolio manager they report to reacts spectacularly when he’s fired by the company’s requisitely icy owner Campbell (Eddie Marsan) and his partner Paul (Rich Sommer). Speculation begins immediately about who will get the big job.

Emily, who is the only woman in this team, overhears a couple of the guys gossiping about how they think that it’s going to be Luke. And why not. He’s hard-working, approachable, and has the assured vibe of a leader. She goes home with the information and the two celebrate.

Then the phone rings in the wee hours of the morning. Campbell calls Emily to a meeting at a bar and, to her surprise, gives her the job, citing her impressive track record. When she gets home and tells Luke, she’s a little rattled and apologizes to him. But he doesn't seem fazed and is supportive. So far, so good.

There’s no easing into the big job. In the intense world of hedge funds, Emily is immediately on deck. She suddenly has a lot of power and is expected to make fast decisions based on the research by her analysts — including Luke, who now reports to her. And those decisions can happen privately, in her office, or in meetings where everyone is present and can see her accept or reject the advice of her analysts. The shift in the power dynamic is immediately evident.

Emily is also now privy to the unfiltered thoughts of Campbell and Paul, and that includes feelings about Luke and their assessment of his track record, which takes her by surprise.

On top of it all, Emily has texted her mother the news of their engagement, and her mother phones and texts constantly wanting to set up an engagement party. Emily can’t seem slow her aggressive mother’s trajectory down; Luke has yet to tell his family.

Domont’s clever script goes deeper into the dynamics at play for Emily and Luke in a workplace that still plays by old rules. And for many women, I suspect, it will feel very familiar.

Relationships, intense, competitive work environments… these are familiar movie settings. But Fair Play is written and directed by a woman and reflects a more direct perspective of what can happen when a woman starts to rise through the ranks and moves into a position where she now is the boss of her male counterparts. Sexual politics is at the centre of Fair Play, but this isn’t a polemic. It’s much more nuanced.

A big part of the film’s success is the excellent work of its cast. Both Dynevor and Ehrenreich are terrific, able to convey the subtle and sometimes not-so-subtle shifts in what they’re experiencing together as a couple and as individuals.

Both characters are dealing with internal earthquakes that are challenging their own identities, in small ways that start to add up, destabilizing who they thought they were, and what their values are. That they feel like full-blooded human beings navigating both the office politics and their own strengths and weaknesses makes this resonate.

This is a Netflix production, which is being given a theatrical run, presumably to make sure it qualifies for Oscar and other awards consideration. It’s tempting to stay home and wait for it to hit the platform, but this is a drama worth being seen on the big screen.

Fair Play. Written and directed by Chloe Domont. Starring Phoebe Dynevor, Alden Ehrenreich, Eddie Marsan, and Rich Sommer. In theatres, September 29 and on Netflix October 6.