Lesson plan
20 Dates
20 Dates is a 1998 American mockumentary film. Myles Berkowitz directs and stars as himself, a man who decides to combine "the two biggest failures in my life--professional and personal" by setting out on a filmed quest to have 20 dates and come out with both a movie career and a love interest. While most of his dates are disasters of varying stripes, Myles ultimately meets the lovely Elisabeth on his 17th date and they completely hit it off, leaving him with a new dilemma when he wants to finish the movie anyway and puts his new romance at risk. In real life, Elisabeth and Myles were married in 2000 and had a daughter but were divorced around 2015, with her meeting and marrying someone else. In addition, a 2014 article by Elisabeth about ending her marriage to Myles (who isn't named but is described in it) states that she and Berkowitz were together for "18 years" and married for 14; if this is accurate, then the film isn't even a partial documentary but 100% fiction and that all of the drama in it was fraudulent.
Article summary
20 Dates is a 1998 American mockumentary film. Myles Berkowitz directs and stars as himself, a man who decides to combine "the two biggest failures in my life--professional and personal" by setting out on a filmed quest to have 20 dates and come out with both a movie career and a love interest. While most of his dates are disasters of varying stripes, Myles ultimately meets the lovely Elisabeth on his 17th date and they completely hit it off, leaving him with a new dilemma when he wants to finish the movie anyway and puts his new romance at risk. In real life, Elisabeth and Myles were married in 2000 and had a daughter but were divorced around 2015, with her meeting and marrying someone else. In addition, a 2014 article by Elisabeth about ending her marriage to Myles (who isn't named but is described in it) states that she and Berkowitz were together for "18 years" and married for 14; if this is accurate, then the film isn't even a partial documentary but 100% fiction and that all of the drama in it was fraudulent.
Key claims
No claims recorded.
Discussion questions
- Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
- Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
- If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?
Bibliography
No sources recorded.
Key claims and bibliography are generated from the same tracked claims and sources as the article page.