 "The New Yorker" largely concurred, noting that Shafer "keep[s] condescension at bay with some nice comic spins" but finding the use of the death of Shafer's friend as Shafer's catalyst for coming out to be self-serving.The "San Francisco Chronicle" was far harsher, deriding the film as a "vanity" production and complaining "There's no shape to "Man of the Year", no forward movement.