Do we like Adam Sandler?
Our score: 7 out of 10. A long, friendly record and some real giving, held back by dated gay jokes, a contested film set and a reunion movie with a co-star whose recent set drew an apology.
Sandler broke out on Saturday Night Live in the 1990s, then turned the goofy-man-child act into a film empire with Billy Madison, Happy Gilmore, The Wedding Singer and Big Daddy. His Happy Madison company keeps the same gang employed. Along the way he showed he could act, in Punch-Drunk Love and Uncut Gems, and Happy Gilmore 2 gave Netflix its biggest opening weekend ever.
The messiest chapter was The Ridiculous Six in 2015. About a dozen Native American actors left the Netflix set, objecting to inaccurate portrayals of their culture and to jokes they called racist, including character names like “Beaver's Breath”. Sandler called it a misunderstanding and said it was taken out of context. That's his side; the actors' complaint was about the jokes, and the film's defenders and critics have never agreed on who was right.
On the harm check, we found no words from Sandler himself against LGBTQ+ people, women, migrants or the planet. His films are the issue: The Advocate argued in 2016 that gay jokes were “bread and butter” in his comedies, naming Chuck and Larry, The Wedding Singer and Little Nicky. Back in 2007 he said he'd help gay-rights causes if he could, though that is a line, not a campaign. That's a dated-comedy problem, not a pattern of hostility, and the record on his politics is thin.
The company he keeps is the live question. Rob Schneider is back as a lead in Grown Ups 3. In 2024 TheWrap reported that Schneider's charity-gala set included anti-trans jokes and jokes about vaccine policies, that he was reportedly booed, and that the hospital foundation apologised. Those are Schneider's words, not Sandler's, and it's one film rather than a career of it, but it earns the asterisk.
The good stuff is real. He won the Kennedy Center's Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in 2023, and in 2019 he ran a Facebook fundraiser for the Thirst Project, which brings clean water to communities in Africa, in memory of his late co-star Cameron Boyce. It raised nearly $15,000. His tribute called Boyce “the nicest, most talented, and most decent kid around.”
So: would we support him? Mostly yes. He's kind to his crew by every account we read, he's kept the same mates for decades, and there's no sign of the grievance slide that sinks so many comedians. The asterisk is for the old jokes, the Ridiculous Six walkout and a Grown Ups reunion that includes Schneider. If Sandler ever says something about that, we'd want to hear it.