Jenny Slate has spent the better part of a decade proving that a single season on Saturday Night Live, and one famously accidental F-bomb, was merely the prologue to a career defined by startling emotional intelligence and a relentless pursuit of the “weird.”
While Slate’s long been a favorite of the indie comedy scene, her performance in the upcoming drama Carousel officially cements her as a powerhouse serious actress who no longer needs a punchline to command a room.
Premiering at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival on January 22, Carousel marks a tonal shift for the actress. Directed by Rachel Lambert, the same fella who turned the quiet Sometimes I Think About Dying into a cult favorite.
This film is a grounded, melancholic romance that strips away the high-energy quirks we’ve come to expect from Slate.
Review: Carousel starring Jenny Slate
In Carousel, Slate plays Rebecca, a woman who returns to her hometown of Cleveland after a high-stakes political career in Washington, D.C. has left her feeling spiritually hollow. When she reconnects with Noah (Chris Pine), a divorced doctor struggling to raise an anxious teenage daughter, the film avoids the “second chance” clichés of a Hallmark movie. Instead, Slate and Pine deliver a masterclass in the heavy, unsaid weight of shared history.
Slate’s performance is nothing short of a revelation. She operates at a lower frequency here, trading her signature kinetic movement for a stillness that feels heavy with regret. As Rebecca, she has to navigate the friction of being a “successful” outsider returning to a place that no longer fits her, while coaching a debate team that includes Noah’s daughter.
It is in these scenes—the interaction between a woman who has “made it” and a girl who is terrified of the world—where Slate shines brightest. She brings a maternal yet unsentimental edge to the role, proving she can anchor a prestige drama with the best of them. If you’ve been tracking her trajectory, this shouldn’t come as a surprise, but seeing it realized on screen feels like a “checkmate” move for her career.
The Pine-Slate chemistry
The buzz out of Park City is focused heavily on the chemistry between Slate and Pine. It’s an inspired pairing; Pine brings a weary, blue-collar nobility that acts as the perfect foil to Slate’s sharp-edged, metropolitan exhaustion. They don’t just feel like “movie stars” together; they feel like people who actually broke each other’s hearts in 2004 and are only now finding the vocabulary to talk about it.
Slate, in particular, handles the film’s “winsome but wise” tone with a precision that few other actors could manage. She avoids the trap of making Rebecca too “hard” or too “vulnerable,” landing instead in that messy middle ground where most real adults actually live. It is a performance of immense dignity and subtle power.
How to see Jenny Slate’s new movie
For those not lucky enough to be trudging through the snow in Utah, Carousel won’t remain a festival secret for long. Following its January 22 premiere, the film will be available for online public screenings from January 29 to February 1, 2026, via the Sundance Festival Player.
While a wide theatrical release date hasn’t been officially set, the heat behind this performance suggests a major distributor will be snapping it up for a late-year awards push. In a year that has already seen several SNL alums taking major swings (see: Kate McKinnon’s sci-fi pivot), Jenny Slate has managed to deliver the most human, and perhaps most haunting, performance of the lot.
Carousel isn’t just a movie about going home again; it’s a movie about Jenny Slate finally finding her permanent home as one of the most vital dramatic actors of her generation.
