When a supermom lands a Shark Tank deal, she switches roles with her breadwinner husband, who struggles to adapt as a stay-at-home dad to their three daughters. (from IMDb)

Family-friendly comedian Nate Bargatze makes his feature film debut with 2026's The Breadwinner. With acclaimed singer/actress Mandy Moore for support, Bargatze steps into the role of a successful car salesman, and father of three daughters, who suddenly becomes a full-time stay-at-home dad when his wife travels overseas in pursuit of an artistic dream. The film is very family-friendly, keeping things pretty tame throughout, and leans heavily on physical comedy and silliness to keep our attention. However, despite valiant efforts all around, the story doesn't quite work well enough.

Part of the problem might be Nate as a lead, and part of it is definitely in the approach to the story. Nate Bargatze plays Nate Wilcox, keeping up that age-old tradition of a comedian playing a character named after himself, like Eddie Cantor, Jackie Chan, or Jerry Seinfeld, to name a few. Nate's acting is actually surprisingly fine for the film, but he doesn't quite have leading-man energy. The story relies heavily on the comedy stemming from Nate being rather incompetent at almost everything, except selling cars. Moore plays a charming, lovable, sweet and extremely capable wife as Katie Wilcox -- she's truly a delight and really lights up the screen here. But Nate feels like he sleepwalks through the film. And his absolute ineptness exhibited throughout the movie is just embarrassing and unfunny. Someone like Chris Farley can pull a persona like that off pretty well because of his demeanor, personality and charm -- then again, I don't think he ever took on the stay-at-home dad role like Nate does here. When Nate tries to use a toaster and it doesn't work, he immediately gives up, even though it's pretty obvious that it's simply unplugged. His solution? Putting the bread slices right on the open flame burner of the stove. His attempt to make eggs is almost as inept and embarrassing, and it's just cringy in the worst way.

The Breadwinner feels like equal parts Mr. Mom, The Money Pit and Jingle All The Way (the disappointing-career-minded-dad theme), but Bargatze doesn't have the charm of Michael Keaton, Tom Hanks, or even Arnold Swartzenegger. But, honestly, it's probably also just the weak script that doesn't help Nate. The movie was co-written by Nate with Dan Lagana, but it's a job that probably should have been entrusted to stronger writers (no shade toward Nate, though). Bargatze is a likeable guy, don't get me wrong. And his standup material is usually quite funny. But, The Breadwinner just doesn't seem to be the right project for him. Bargatze seems like he's perfect as a buddy to a lead character, and that probably would have been the best starter role for the comedian than jumping right into the lead with a script as faulty as this one.

Everyone around Bargatze gives it their best, though. Again, Moore is great, but comedic actors Will Forte and Colin Jost also support Nate in his dad-life storyline, while Kumail Nanjiani and Zach Cherry bring the support at his job as a salesman for Toyota. Forte's roofer character is strange, but it's perfect for him, while Jost seems to be channeling a bit more of a more harmless version of Phil Hartman's Jingle All the Way neighbor creep. Jost's Conor is a goofy, also inept, married man who hangs out with the moms at their kids' school. And when Nate threatens to charm the mom clique, Conor gets bizarrely defensive of his status (which reminds me of the ladies man schtick of Ted in Jingle All the Way), but in the end, Conor just wants to be pals with Nate. However, it all just comes off a little too weird. Forte feels like a live action cartoon character, with his antics seeming a little out of place for this particular movie, but he does bring a couple of the film's few laughs.

All that said, I've certainly seen worse movies. I'd really recommend any of the aforementioned similar movies before this one, but The Breadwinner is squeaky clean compared to those movies. The Breadwinner has been described as a dated film, but I don't think its throwback to movies of this kind is the problem. It's hard to relate to (and not get offended by) a lead father who is portrayed as so dumb and clueless, even if it's meant to be cute or endearing. (And these days, with society trying so hard to diminish the role of fathers in the family dynamic, something as well-meaning as The Breadwinner can almost do more harm than good.) It's just hard to believe anyone could be so stupid, to be honest. Again, maybe seeing Keaton use an iron to toast one of his kids' sandwiches may come across as dumb or clueless, but he does it more with the "I don't care, this works for me" swagger than just being too dumb to check to see if the toaster is plugged in in the first place. (Also, has Nate really not heard of YouTube for learning how to do things he doesn't know how to do?)

The content of The Breadwinner is really clean. A few "G-d"'s do slip out of the characters, but it's always done as exclamations and aren't supposed to offend or be crass (Bargatze is, after all, a Christian himself). There is really only one clearly suggestive remark, and that comes from Forte's roofer character, Keegan, who suggestively quips that his ex-wife said his "tools don't get the job done." That's a joke for the parents, while it's likely to go over the heads of the younger ones. All of the other content is pretty much just slapstick comedic violence. At one point, Nate thinks a horse is dead because it's sleeping lying down, and starts debating on how to dispose of the body. When he goes to move it, however, it springs to life and causes a lot of destruction in the process.

In the end, The Breadwinner is a harmless family comedy. I do think younger viewers might enjoy it more than the parents, but fans of comedian Nate Bargatze are likely to enjoy it as well. It's kind of dumb and silly, but I do suppose there are worse ways you can spend 99 minutes. It's nice to have more family-friendly comedies -- I just wish it were better.

- John DiBiase (reviewed: 7/16/26)

Making of The Breadwinner (6:06) - They talk here about how much of the story is based on his standup and how they aimed to make the movie family-friendly. They also mention how a bunch of big companies were happy to work with them - like Walmart and Toyota. They also talk about shooting in a real Toyota dealership and shoooting the Shark Tank episode footage.

Daditude, Sharks and a Horse: Casting The Breadwinner (4:43) - We find out that they had wanted Mandy Moore right from the start and were thrilled she agreed. Nate has a lot of comedic friends and they were all happy to work with him.

More Bloopers! (2:36) - This is a slightly extended version of what is shown as the credits roll at the end of the movie. (And they're not especially funny.)

A Standup on Set (2:58) - This is probably funnier than the actual movie itself. This is a brief mockumentary gag about Nate sneaking microphones onto the set because he can't break free from his standup habits. It's kinda great. (1 "Oh my G-d")

Line-o-Rama's - These are just a few moments of the actors riffing and ad-libbing continuously.

Deleted Scenes

• Plan Before Bed (0:28) - Katie finds that, per Nate's instruction, Sam went to bed in her clothes so she was ready to go the next day.
• Bedtime (0:32) - Nate and the kids are watching the original Jumanji and he suddenly tries to get them to go to bed, but they protest that it's only 6:30pm.
• Freeze Scumbag (1:57) - Nate accidentally sets off the house alarm and can't figure out how to turn it off. When Nate wanders outside, Keegan jumps off the roof and tackles Nate - thinking he's an intruder - and then punches him repeatedly till he realizes it's Nate.
• Welcome Home (0:39) - Keegan welcomes Katie home and tells her he's an inventor just like her.
• Roof Reasons (0:22) - Keegan says he has to take off the front door for "roof reasons."
• Mike Vanderholden - Extended (1:14) - It was hard enough to watch this interaction the first time, but this is a slightly extended version of Nate meeting another dealership owner at work who wants Nate's help in getting him in contact with the Shark Tank folks.

- John DiBiase, (reviewed: 7/16/26)