Stained Couch Cushions -- Sophisticated TV Musings

[iluvtv]

Still Watching: A Love Letter to my Mom

The content below has not been censored for your consideration as neither the Real Housewives nor my mother would have approved of such blasphemy.

The decline in blogging was conveniently intentional.

There were other projects.

My career as a TV critic wasn’t exactly gaining steam.

My readership technically wasn’t booming.

For a time there had been an unmistakable fulfillment in my blogging habits.

Full disclosure: this work held undeniable titillation, provoked as it were by the vain echoes of my own subconscious. It was too enticing not to indulge  the ego, booming, unselfconsciously through the page as I “eloquently” deciphered probable intentions of a writer’s room.

But was this self-aggrandizing, albeit surely intellectually stimulating task truly worthwhile?

I kept falling back on this tricky notion of time management. Was taking copious amounts of notes regarding my viewing habits (a laborious task which required endless rewinds and thusly an inability to watch TV with others) coupled with the studious investment of actually researching and writing a cohesive piece which included a clear argument for television as a medium and thereby proving a consistent thesis, truly a valuable use of my time?

Not to mention, of course, the added effort of finagling my mother to invest her energies toward a strong copy-edit.

It was an investment, sure. But then again none of it was necessarily difficult at least in the classical sense of the word.

Actually, the engaging my mother bit was sort of easy. Not only was I skilled at the subtle art of stroking of her ego; “Your attention to detail is just so much better than mine. You are so smart…” I also possessed a valuable trump card which, admittedly, brought as much pleasure as my own voice: she actually liked my writing!

To have known my mother is to know what a huge compliment this fan-dom truly was.

My mother was proudly authentic. She had no shame over her inability to “fake it”.

This personality trait demanded a certain dedication on her part. She was famous for telling my girlfriends they looked like sluts at our eighth-grade dance and embarrassing fits at the market while her younger children tried to disappear into the kid’s seat of the shopping cart. Patronizing eye rolls were par for the course. When a third grade Hebrew School teacher lauded my literary skills my loving, supportive mother made it abundantly clear she didn’t think I was a bad writer but maybe just too… precious?

Admittedly, poetry about attempted genocide from an eight-year-old may hold some tonal issues.

No matter, after 30 years of practice I had found my niche. I was everything she seemed to be looking for in a writer: I would rather drink turpentine than emote and I like really “got” satire. Finally, my words were funny and thusly, the woman who had helped foster this cynical humor had little trouble understanding my intentions.

We fell into lockstep. Her killer, critical eye and unparalleled editing skills were a welcomed privilege. I was no longer precious. A trait which carried over in my ability to “take a note.” I fully understood the value of a critical red pen from a grammar die-hard. Particularly one, who not only had a deep ceded appreciation for my style (she helped cultivate it, after all) but also a keen understanding of the objective, which only a mother could boast.

I was fully aware what a priceless service this was.

And so, I kept watching. My notetaking became obsessive. Whenever I pondered this expense of time, I considered the reality: rewriting dialogue was improving my own. I was becoming a better writer.

Since both my mother and I were committing countless hours to the free and underappreciated service of my viewing recommendations, it didn’t take long for the shows and topics I bothered dissecting to be unequivocally dictated by her unapologetic tastes. Or better stated, my own experience of such.

As an aside, I’d be remiss not to note that in losing both my parents it has become abundantly clear that one’s guardians (especially good ones) mostly exist in relation to ourselves and our already noted inflated egos.

Basically, the television I studied, the theories I pondered, the conclusions I drew had to appeal in large part to Dale Allen Boland. This was a nuanced role. An honest woman of remarkable talent she also happened to be the strict television gatekeeper of my childhood. Back in the 90’s a desire for this blue light pulsed through my veins like an addict in search of her next hit. I hadn’t been picky at all back then. This was a time in my life when even Jerry Springer reruns in black and white, streamed through bunny ears in my Jr. High weight room took the edge off.

To be frank, while at first her editing felt crucial so as not to embarrass myself on the interwebs it soon became clear that the bigger part of my ask was just any sort of consistent audience. In time it became obvious that my mother hadn’t only become a fan, but she was, in fact, my blog’s only fan.

And as any good writer knows, you gotta’ appeal to your base.

It helped, of course, that my mother had been my earliest educator (dictator) of media. The San Francisco Chronicle’s Datebook and the New Yorker were mainstays next to the can, meaning my earliest poos were made all the more pleasurable by the accompaniment of Adair Lara and John Carrol. By 34 I was not only well versed in what she found tolerable, but also possessed a keen understanding of how to stylize this appeal.

Simpsons? Yes. Danielle Steele? Not so much. Had she given Danielle an opportunity? Of course not! But I was willing to play her game.

We both were expending a lot of energies at this point and since any real readership was in the slim to none margins it was crucial that we at least reward ourselves.

In retrospect I understand that this was actually how we enjoyed time together.

After she died my father noted that my mother and I had always shared a very special intellectual connection. A greater compliment than sharing a literary bond with Dale had never been given. In fact, in my father’s wake it is easy to see that this final gift from him may have been the most important. In saying so, he finally acknowledged what I’d always longed to hear. He respected, perhaps even envied not only my intelligence, but my mother’s too.

While I had given up on blogging years before their deaths, my diligent notetaking continued up until them. I accepted that my time critiquing television for free to a marginal audience had not been without purpose (though I missed the motive of the maternal connection it fostered until just now). I am well aware that through my efforts I had gained the confidence to write a novel. I understood that to maintain this skill set a continued attention to television’s minutia was critical.

But then, she died. Suddenly, grief allowed me space to achieve an entirely different and antithetical goal I’d set years earlier and had made no real efforts to achieve: to do less.

Finally I was able to let thoughts wave over me. I allowed flashes of “brilliance” to be fleeting. I relaxed into a space of agitated ease. I exclusively sought joy. In doing so I concurrently and without coincidence leaned into a brand of watching which had always been considered “just desserts.”

Bravo TV became a life raft. I watched Real Housewives and Summerhouse with a certain amused stillness I hadn’t exhibited since my complacent years as a co-ed.

The day following my mother’s memorial I listened to “Radio Andy” on Siris XM in a monotonous loop throughout the entire 6-hour drive home. I slept to Bravo podcasts. I read tweets from Bravo fan accounts during session breaks.

I noticed Bravo was keeping me smiling. The network and commentary was rewarding me with a source to which I could focus. I appreciated the humor.

Two months later my father died. Mind blank I leaned in harder to the quiet blankness this watching served.

But then, I noticed something.

Watching Kathryn Dennis of Southern Charm open a coke can with her teeth in a loudly expensive living room, next to her foam roller it occurred to me that these women were the antithesis of my own mother.

Vicky Gunvalson whooping it up at a classy resort represented everything my mother had no tolerance for.

To see these women as satirical requires a certain level of empathy for their antics that would have eluded Dale.

Their bad behavior was just too black and white. For my mom there would have been nothing charmingly relatable about a woman like Lisa Barlow of Salt Lake City, placatingly sipping a constant stream of fountain soda through a plastic straw while proudly bragging she wasn’t “like a regular mom,” proving this factoid by feeding her children drive through fast-food for every meal and ignoring their calls when she was at a party.

These are women that bat fake eyelashes and scream at each other through plastic pumped lips. They float effortlessly in azul pools in Mexico boosted by the silicone in their tits.

My mom also wasn’t a regular mom but she wouldn’t have found this indulgent brand of opulence at all inspirational, aspirational or relatable. She did not identify as a “powerhouse” or a woman who needed to tell other women that she “lifted up other women” over an expensive cocktail brunch with “40 of her closest girlfriends” all of whom wielded designer purses like coats of armor.

This trope, repeated often throughout every Housewives franchise for the past 20 years would have just pissed my mother off.

It’s not that she didn’t relate to women behaving badly this just wasn’t her brand of bad behavior. She maybe could have sympathized if they’d been wearing Walmart rather than Prada.

Lorelai Gilmore? Sure, why not? Emily Gilmore? Definitely not.

It’s funny because in a certain sense my mother’s proud authenticity and lack of shame in her outbursts would have made her an ideal housewife. But the weight these women put on things and beauty would have been too damn distracting to her.  

In spite of being a woman whose love language was often a good screaming match she would have found any and all of the dramatic fights on Housewives absolutely insufferable.

And in spite of my deep love for the genre, convincing Dale that any of this was actually satire worth watching would have been an exercise in futility.

I embraced this factoid quietly and with little work on my end (other than setting the DVR to catch up on back seasons of Atlanta) I leaned into a space which never would have been tolerated.

It felt good.

It was my own.

In doing so, I came up with a million things about Bravo to share. Perhaps one day I will. God knows I need to create a new fan base.

But before I could even consider either changing the channel or sitting down to a blog analyzing how one housewife’s ludicrous and racist notion that eating chicken feet was somehow any different than eating chicken nuggets, I got this text from my mom’s best friend: “have you seen Derry Girls.”

Maybe an audience was asking for a resurrection, after all.

But as I flipped to Netflix and started a new note labeled “Derry Girls” it occurred to me that I first must come to terms with how much things have changed.

There is a certain level of self-actualization left amidst the cluttered grief of losing my parents. As I write this, I am continuously tempted to take a break for “Mom’s consideration”. Her feedback would have supplied an unrequited serotonin boost, like a gentle promise to my oh so evasive ego that there was purpose in my efforts, that the writing I was doing was valuable. When my mom was alive I always knew that someone would appreciate my continued efforts, making it tolerable to finish, and tidy, and publish. My mother was like a promise that not only my words but also I myself was worthwhile.

This chore of loving, maternal reassurance is, of course, now my own. A truth my mother, who never needed to brag about lifting up other women, would have celebrated.

Nothing would have made my mom happier than me making my own choices, editing my own words and being my own cheerleader Perhaps she died just to prove it. To know Dale Allen Boland is to suspend belief that she maybe could have made her last stubborn point through such dramatic means.

And to be totally frank; that is a storyline not even a housewife could pull off.

Thank you for being my greatest cheerleader. I love you Mom.

[iluvtv]

Seen in Scenes

Often art is wonderful because it feels as though it is speaking so directly to your individual experience. The intimacy in these moments can practically break your heart -- there is true power in feeling seen.

This desire to be acknowledged might explain my intrinsic obsession with satire. I never feel so fully understood as when a loved one mocks my misgivings. 

Perhaps my warmest memory of my little brother is when he would mimic my vanity by contorting his face into a somewhat pained overbite smile and craning his neck forward, pronouncing "I'm Sylvie looking in the mirror" -- inducing a shared bellyaching laugh between himself and my high school boyfriend. Similarly, I knew I liked my college boyfriend's group of buddies when they welcomed me to the posse by nicknaming "Bossy McHaterstein".

These people got me, they really got me!

And sometimes TV is just good because it feels likes the jokes were written just for you. 

In these moments I am filled with a warm fuzziness and a fantasy of a few writers combing through my diary for all my wittiest moments, observations and ideas and in a genius moment of inspiration realizing they could get rich just mocking the banality of my wonderfully overinflated ego. 

And why not? At the end of the day, all our most embarrassing rants and habits generally kept so close to the sleeve are actually really, really fucking relatable to enough people to garner award-winning audiences. I mean isn't it obvious? Behind all our makeup, botox, fashion, and rehearsed dialogues it is within the fleshy nasty bits where our true humanity hides. Those are the parts that make us simultaneously unique and also pretty fucking similarly hilarious. 

Almost everything I prioritize on my watch-list is fueled by this narcissistic need for comic relief and so in the spirit of not overlooking my ever-accumulating television viewing notes of shows which I already gave full-service blogs to last season, I'll just brief you on a few stand out quotes from my winter's streaming season. If nothing else maybe you'll be inspired to pick up a new show. Or better yet start writing your own about how very endearing all my anomalies are... I have lots of journals and am happy to collaborate. I mean why aren't we getting rich?!

First and foremost, Brockmire. In its second season Hank Azaria once again knocks it out of the ballpark (see what I did there?! A baseball pun for a baseball show! I told you, I'm available to hire as a working writer!) Consistently, all my favorite quotes in this series speak to Jim Brockmire's unabashed use of alcohol and narcotics. 

When Brockmire is told that being drunk makes him more likable to his radio audience he responds: "Those are the words that in his heart every alcoholic longs to be true." 

Hilarious! 

Viscerally we do all pray for this reality. 

hang on just one moment so I can have a drink and then you'll like my writing even more.

Alcohol is wonderful because even if others don't like me more when I drink I think I’m funnier

This makes me think of a wonderful line in the much-beloved series Letterkenny "People should only get hammered together so they never have to see how obnoxious their friends actually are."

Drunken conversations (come to think of it many sober ones too) are often random babble that floats from topic to topic without a coherent throughline. Many stories are not quite seen through from beginning to end. Nowadays we've branded this comedy and it even is a titled genre. Thank goodness! Non-sequiturs drive so much of the humor seen on television today and as I said, a little inebriation doesn't really hurt this “style”. Booze-fueled rants are perfect for non-sequiturs and sure, perhaps a true genius can conjure this wit sober but I'll live in the fantasy land where the gin is really helping.

Another untested theory that might help this special brand of comedy is one's gender. In an episode of my new podcast obsession (I have a lot of these) Good One, Julie Klausner attributes most of TV's best non-sequitur television not to alcoholics but to females.

This makes sense since actually talking is a necessity to this genre.

Clearly, we all owe Tina Fey quite a bit for popularizing this trend in 30 Rock. While the character she portrays in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt seems convinced she can only function if she compartmentalizes her life to the point of nightly blackouts, something tells me in real life Fey isn't coming up with these speedy off the cuff jokes in quite the same state. 

It's called ACTING, people!

In the final episodes of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Fey and the rest of the Kimmy Machine do not let us down. Appealing to my love of all random, mostly embarrassing and yet somehow unbearably relatable moments, the dialogue in these episodes is funny because you can simultaneously laugh and pretend you would absolutely never say/do/think any of these things while 100% knowing that the only thing between your behavior and theirs is just a couple more glasses of champagne. Like when Titus uses the pickles from his hamburgers as the soothing cucumbers a woman who actually takes care of her skin might rest on her eyelids while having a facial. Or when Lilian explains farties is a common nickname for children because "they smell bad, they almost always were an accident and you have to be extra worried if they're silent."

It just feels right to laugh at what we might imagine being the very worst version of ourselves.

Indeed, moments of doom can be terribly hilarious. How about the still wonderfully important Superstore a network sitcom which four seasons in still addresses important issues addressing our present socio-economic-political climate with one of the freshest voices I have yet to see on TV?! 

The crucial voice of this series is in large part thanks to another amazing female, America Ferrara (who coincidentally, was recently interviewed by NYT on the very apropos topic of being seen on TV).

This show creates truly refreshing (almost light) humor from some of the darkest plights that are facing Americans today. Health care, maternity leave, citizenship, and student loan debt... no topic is too taboo! It really should be required television as it offers quick wit, non-sequiturs, gag humor, romance and actual representation to huge parts of our population whose stories are normally left either in the margins or in tragic headlines. The diverse representation here is truly remarkable. And while I may be able to identify easily with basic bitch alcohol memes I am also fueled be a deep-seated passion for social justice and cultural-education and am equally adept at laughing at the asinine nature of my friend's plights as hard as I laugh at my own.

Like when Dina is encouraged to hold Glenn's baby for which she was the surrogate and instead voices utter disinterest; "it's kind of like shopping at Goodwill and you see a shirt you donated. For a second it feels meaningful and then you realize it's not." Or when the staff gets snowed into the store overnight and is stuck debating whether to watch Game of Thrones Season One or Friends Season Nine on DVD the general consensus is neither, "I agree, I watch TV to escape, not to watch more white people." 

How reassuring then that there are spaces on television now where everyone can be seen from the alcoholic sportscaster to the overweight black gay struggling actor, to the strong-willed assistant manager of a big box superstore. Here, in these fleshy bits, we can all laugh-- even the San Francisco personal trainer can relate. Deep down we all are imbeciles and we also all secretly would hate to change.

[iluvtv]

Thank you, it’s my attitude that keeps me young...

Processing Russian Doll has not been easy. It took a week and a full rewatch for me to even begin to touch this beautiful program’s intricacies through type. The iterations and research I prepared for this post have been almost as vast and extensive as the show itself.  Nearly a month later I decided to save the diatribes for casual conversation. Theories on how the show is a study of the Jewish allegory of Dybbuk or that the loss of characters throughout each life is mirroring the constant death of video game culture can surely be found elsewhere. Instead, I share a version of the draft I started jotting during my rewatch of this beautifully complicated story while sitting on the couch next to my own Mother, both of us quietly reckoning with the histories which brought us to that shared moment. 

Writing, like experience, is a process. For many, this show has brought on personal reflections of their own existential crisis. Presently, a communal and varied reception is floating through our technological ether, acting as intellectual interpretations of such.

And so, in an unusual act of rebellion, I will let my work here act as nothing more than an experiment in my strange and frequently limited relationship with emotions. An armored sort of void that is not without its own challenges.

Like Nadia I sometimes might be written off as the abyss.

And yet neither of us are enthusiastic about or entirely unharmed by such descriptions.

I have no illusions of blowing any minds here with an overtly innovative (though so often it feels that way to me) analysis of Russian Doll, and if you want to avoid spoilers perhaps just stop now (though nothing I say here would ruin your own experience with the show). However, if you want to go exploring through some proverbial baggage with me — I have just too many thoughts, tangents and feels not to write anything at all...

But first:

Holy.

Fucking.

Shit.

I am at once moved, inspired, shaken and totally stunted. The vast creativity in writing and performance and imagery and music within these eight 24-minute episodes could debilitate many an artist. It's so easy here to rationalize giving up. There is no way I could ever create something as powerfully moving and detailed as Russian Doll.

This speaks to the intense fragility (so rarely acknowledged) which Headland, Lyonne and Poehler’s creation has provoked within.

This show, like it’s namesake which holds infinite women inside one another, is an onion. It can be peeled endlessly away— there is no core. The similes housed are so nuanced that solving them all would be a luxurious and laborious service. An intellectual’s ideal wank. Something future generations may hang their Philosophy dissertations on; much like the very pretentious characters which this show so cleverly mocks.

How very unusual, a narrative with notably distinct translations identifiable to everyone from the now aging homeless advocate of New York City in the 90’s to the Jewish millennial living in San Francisco currently participating in gentrification, to the middle-aged dad who never quite got over his suicidal tendencies, to the gamers and engineers entirely distracted with code. It is a glorious conglomeration of our own narcissism and the show’s creative genius which will allow us all to see ourselves here.

Twitter threads and articles debating such translations could distract our own heart for hours. In the end, though it is compassion which will leave room for growth and learning. In time we will not just slice the orange in half and find the ripeness in the fourth dimension but we will also discover another layer, or perhaps metaphors even the creators missed.

In part isn’t this some of the beauty of an increased number of minorities (ahem women) making art reaching the mainstream? The long-whispered narratives of silenced humans have become far more infinite and intricate than the stories we have heard before.

One might argue that the very notion that Nadia’s misfortune is provoked because she is “bad” defies a complex yet deeply scientific female perspective. It seems rational that a writer's room compiled exclusively of women would have enough experience in niceties to understand that no experience or person is entirely one thing. It is empathy whicxh allows us to view the sum of one’s parts. It is humanity which allows us all to persevere, coexist and most importantly notice that others are just doing the same.

And so there are moments in Russian Doll which speak to me so precisely.

The show’s playful exploration into Jewish Mysticism, which I once studied so diligently.

Nadia’s food choices, which I consistently noted before the subtle stitch of their relevance became obvious threads of the tapestry of her stories. The cottage cheese and roast chicken which is so spot on and terribly, neurotically Jewish. The fact that I noted her breakfast of cut watermelon in episode two as though it were a plot point -- which it did eventually become. My takeaways here so painfully reflect my own layered and tumultuous relationship with my body and moreover nourishment.

Nadia’s penchant for drugs and the ability to maintain her relationship to artificial mood enhancements. Through my lens of a similarly uncomplicated love affair with inebriation, I can’t help but find this characteristic terribly charming.

And oddly enough, Nadia’s clear choice of Emily over Anne. This one is tricky as I have zero memory of reading Emily of New Moon and yet I clearly remember loving it while Anne of Green Gables bored me. I know this sounds contrived but my mother concurred: I was a girl who loved Emily; couldn’t be bothered with Anne.

Then there are the less overt parts of Nadia. The painful side effects of what can be more easily spelled out. These are the elements of self I skip over (as did Nadia presumably) the histories of abuse and dysfunction, the draw towards said abyss and the imaginary, the solitude. Here we have a vibrant woman, unabashedly possessing an immodest thirst for life — an extrovert essentially, who somehow manages to remain on the peripheries. Again, this would be a perfectly apt way to describe me. Through silly, fun, terrifying, real and completely magical events however, Nadia is forced to reckon with both her past (and future) and come to terms with relativity.

I mean life is relative, right?

Watching all this forced a reckoning of my own.

People fade, plants and animals die, fruit rots and all the while Nadia battles with the existentialism turning 36 inevitably breeds.

(Speaking of invoked narcissisms I have for years threatened to throw myself an “I still haven’t gotten married or had kids so you never had to go to a bunch of bullshit showers but I’m going to have a huge double chai blowout” of my own. As the time approaches (14 months) this seems increasingly unlikely but the relevance of this age was definitely not lost on me).

Through all this sadness it is the small acts of kindness which somehow makes everything all right again and again. Very subtle pieces of humanity perpetuate life.

Relatively speaking.

Compassionate and honest interaction essentially induces a continued existence.

Alan says, “Our bodies can’t keep lying the way that our minds can”

And when Ruth mentions she heard the author of Emily of New Moon is haunting a house rather than the more familiar trope of Lucy Maud Montogomery’s suicide this makes me think the show is so much more about how you survive and persevere than how you fade.

As I slowly worked through these episodes (the first time) I wished hard that this show would offer hope and eventually it did just that.

But boy did it put me through the wringer through the process.

[iluvtv]

Mom Guilt

Since today I will be tackling the taboo topics of both guilt and remorse I may as well start with my own caveat; I apologize.

I'm going to do some mom-splaining here...

Recently I watched the first ten episodes of both I'm Sorry and I Feel Bad. Both shows are Momedies and in case you hadn't noticed I am far more fluent in the more ego-centric brand of SWF Humor. No matter, intrigued by these curiously similar premises and my general obsession with female comedic powerhouses (including the women behind these titles) I assumed I had nothing to lose (ten hours on the sofa aside).

In full disclosure, while Andrea Savage's I'm Sorry wasn't exactly a show I fell for immediately, the stellar cast and the unapologetically hilarious style of Savage's parenting was enough to keep me watching. A clever choice indeed, by the final episode of Season One I felt pure sadness that I had no more episodes to watch and apologetic that I hadn't immediately understood the show's intentions. While my earliest notes state I am impressed by the cast they also indicate confusion towards the uneven tone.  Or to be as authentic as Savage my actual notations read as such:

"So many snappy quips.

Cast is epic...

Hope show gets better.

RN all just parents talking shit"

As I struggled to grasp I'm Sorry I also started dabbling with I Feel Bad. A show I found so problematic that no matter which lens I looked through I just wound up feeling... well, bad.

My ability to embrace the intentions behind I'm Sorry was aided through Savage's interview on Dax Shepard's (wonderful) podcast Armchair Expert. Her voice allowed a clear point of reference, making it much easier to deduce the ambitions behind her creative portrayal of just how humorous motherhood is. 

The feminist credo she passes to her daughter doesn't hurt the show's hilarity either. Savage's offbeat parenting hacks towards inciting female power seemingly misfire, all the while actually breeding a totally self-actualized kid who will proudly push back on the agenda. Amelia patiently explains to her mother "Ariel doesn't need a voice because she is the prettiest."

Savage makes this whole process just so darn relatable.

So, maybe I am just an ignorant audience and I still don't get I Feel Bad. Maybe a few interviews and episodes later I'll be espousing this show as the sleeper hit I knew about all along. But for now, as a woman who very much does not "have it all" I couldn't help but feel insulted by I Feel Bad's beautiful, successful protagonist, Emet. This is a mom who spends each episode lamenting her inability to "do it all" while somehow managing to round off each half hour by achieving whatever seemed implausible earlier in the day. Along the way, her funny, nuclear (though, to be fair racially diverse) family, comedically (and again, to be fair, often judgmentally) applauds her missteps.

Somehow each episode lands like a small punch in the gut. By episode six I was pretty sure I was being Sheryl Sanberg'ed all over again.

Emet's successful gaming illustration job, sweet and loving husband, goofy dad, terribly hands-on mom and mostly self-sufficient children (we hardly ever even see the baby) is all just a little much. This is a working mom that makes leaning in look suspiciously like lying down.

So, is I Feel Bad actually the minority mother's manifesto it was built as or is it just another major female guilt trip?

Admittedly here, Savage's television alter-ego which is practically exclusively based in reality is a wildly talented and beautiful comedienne, married to a successful lawyer with a cute (if sometimes obnoxiously inconvenient) daughter. In spite of this the show somehow just doesn't feel overdone. Instead, her down to earth approach to life and incessant and often deprecating commentary induce both cringing and appreciative nodding. Even I understand her plight and I am a single woman living in a one bedroom apartment writing a blog for free.

Perhaps this can be attributed to the humor. Savage's commitment to every joke intrinsically carries this series.

Once I finished listening to her and Dax chat I was entirely smitten with this woman. She sees the world through satire tinged goggles, she is attracted to banter and surrounds both her work and home life with this ethic.

Realizing the comedians on her show were mostly improvising I embraced the occasional awkwardness in tone for all it was intended to be.

It is this constantly improving unrehearsed dialogue in which, I'm Sorry thrives. The show has a fabulously charming Curb your Enthusiasm feel but I suppose I need to quantify this statement.

I understand charming to mean Judith Light telling Andrea Savage to go fuck herself during a geriatric Zumba class when Savage (the youngest person in the room by some 20-odd years) requests to turn up the A/C. Or charming like when your newly not racist four-year-old daughter runs into the "grown-up" dinner party in blackface  (the very same exclusively invited guests who just discovered you probably peed on your hands to alleviate the "jalapeno burn" you acquired whilst preparing their guacamole) only to announce that she is "Fat Albert!" Charming like when your best friend gleefully squeals, "I'm just so excited to see what you have planned next! First piss guac, then blackface. Its probably going to be something antisemitic!" Charming like 7a at the fertility clinic watching men leave the waiting room one by one to go masturbate in a cup and appreciating the experience as nothing more than amazing content."It's kind of like the reverse walk of shame," Savage announces gaining hearty laughs from the other patients and causing her husband to shrink into his chair, muttering; "please don't engage the room."

This is the kind of parenting I can comprehend.

I'm Sorry features a team already skilled at doing improvisation with one another and while it does take a bit for both viewer and actor to fully grasp the unpredictable tone of a real-life mom, it's bumps and misses are a welcome side effect of both the show and actual motherhood.

This story focus' on the perils a funny mom who writes crass humor for a living might actually have to face. Her writing partner, Kyle (Jason Mantzoukas) wonders how she can go from "blow jobs to kindergarten" and her husband teases: "Moms aren't supposed to be funny. Don't you watch TV? Get more hairy and tired."

All teasing from loved ones aside, this show works because Andrea is not actually perfect. She explains in the first episode that she is "disgusting" and later acknowledges she is on an equal playing field with a woman she once accused of being a "garbage person".  These fallacies lead to a character who is both likable and entirely relatable; I too am struggling through a semi-charmed life with plenty to apologize for.

Most notable perhaps, is the final two scenes of season one when Savage accidentally changes her email signature to her favorite (just for laughs) porn picture of a girl biting a man's dick (this is a pic she utilizes as an ongoing gag in many different facets and even unwittingly exposes her four-year-old daughter to at one point in the season). Without realizing her mistake, she shoots off an email to the elite kindergarten her daughter was just accepted to, informing them how thrilled her family is to join the school next fall. Spoiler alert, the season ends with her begging for redemption.

But that's the thing, we don't know if she'll get it and if the Dean's face is any indication Amelia's future here looks highly doubtful.

And while this is an error perhaps enhanced for the comedic effect her apology does sound genuine. She hadn't quite meant for her humor to hurt her daughter's future, an intent likely all decent mom's can relate to

Far less avant-garde, I Feel Bad follows the mainstream sitcom throughline in which conflict is presented, dealt with and solved all in the matter of one episode. Personally, I have no problem with this tactic, designed of course to give us a fresh start each week. The problem here lies with the premise of the show. How badly can you really feel about an error which only takes 28 minutes with commercials to rectify? But what really grates at me here is that our protagonist hasn't so much as fixed her problem as she's found a grovely way to make it redeeming. If anything, it's more insulting that Emet’s cute creativeness has all but rendered her infallible.

For all the enjoyment of Andrea's apology-prompting endeavors (Amelia sharing the gossip of her mother's stretched out vagina to her pre-school chums. Andrea and her mother commiserating about being stuck in successful marriages all the while knowing they'd be at their very best as sexy widows), Emet’s missteps just prompt angst. She left me wondering if I was somehow failing at life. Why wasn't own annoying TV family rallying around my picturesque existence, rooting for me as I lamented my imperfections?

Case in point: during I Feel Bad's holiday episode Emet allegedly feels bad because her kids don't know about their own culture.

I say allegedly here because in actuality she displays zero remorse for her kids' minimal grasp on both Judaism and Hinduism. What Emet actually seems concerned with (as is true in almost every episode) is not her children's well-being but rather how she comes across to the world. In this particular episode, the person she is most concerned with impressing is her Mother in Law. She does this by hiding her own mother inside a Casino.

In some sort of off-beat coup Emet pays the Indian side of her family to silence through Paula Abdul tickets and a $300 credit card charge at CVS ("just imagine how long that receipt is?!" her husband laments)  and while admittedly this is a good hush approach if you ever are interested in buying my silence it's also kind of a not-so-cute, dare I say asshole move to try to embrace one culture by buying off another (sounds like some kind of ass-backward deal #45 might brag about).

All this is of little concern to Emet and her husband though. Instead, the mezuzah on the door, the brisket on the table and expensive Hannukah decorations in the yard are effective enough, causing one Grandma to swoon while the other returns with a carefully calculated revenge approach aimed at convincing her grandchildren (those kids we allegedly are all so worried about being culturally out of touch) that Diwali is the cooler holiday.

Shenanigans ensue.

The pageantry culminates in a backyard, multi-generational family paint war. Of course, everyone winds up laughing and bonding about Emet’s lies and oddly accept equal blame for her dishonesty, each adult copping to their own inability to raise a future generation to be more woke.

Now everyone is happy, they have created new (and obviously better) traditions and all the while the stereotypical old Jewish couple visiting Emet’s inlaws remain indoors blissfully unaware o the commotion, chatting amongst themselves about what a good brisket "the Indian woman has prepared."

And scene.

Did Emet really ever feel bad that her kids are cultural ignoramus'?

Absolutely not.

Can everyone get behind her scheming, lying and flagrant consumeristic overspending because she said she did? Absolutely.

And her family is colorful and happy. Problem solved, yay!

How bizarre.

I may live 1,000 lives and I will never get away with holiday mischief like this.

I'm Sorry but I can't help but Feel Bad.

And so I suppose now is the time to reflect on the actual difference between the two phrases from which each show hails its title.

Similar, sure but fundamentally, "I feel bad" and "I'm sorry" (not the television shows per se, though it does pertain here)  the actual implications behind these phrases are very, very different. If someone feels bad they crashed your car that somehow has an entirely different ring to it than they're sorry they crashed your car.

Karen R. Koenig a licensed psychotherapist I found online (the best place for psychobabble) explains the phenomenon as such:

“I’m sorry,” usually indicates that people feel regret or remorse for having caused pain: they wish they hadn’t done what they did...This mindset is different from someone feeling guilty. That is, people can feel momentarily badly that they did something wrong, but not regret it. The guilt comes from recognizing that what they did was wrong, but not from actually feeling sorry that it happened. Guilt often arises only because someone gets caught. My take is that most of the time, abusers experience momentary guilt, but little more."

If this doesn't prove I Feel Bad is just the gentle sit-com equivalent of gaslighting I'm not sure what does? I get enough of that noise when I read the news, thank you very much.

[iluvtv]

Hail Canada Finale: Exceptional Lexicon...

Happy 2019! USA’s number 45 may (or may not) be taking full credit for the country suffering a “partial” shutdown but no worries, Hulu came through for the country this holiday season instead. It’s like Santa (or maybe Daddy Warbucks) works in entertainment! As of December 27th the streaming service proved my previous predictions piss poor and gifted America the full glut of Letterkenny backlog. God Bless America.

             Somebody of influence is clearly reading my blog.  

                                              What does this mean to you, Gentle Reader? Why should it matter that while I started drafting a wee work on just how superb this particular Canadian export really is I got entirely consumed with additional episodes? 

To put it simply, appreciation overload. I am now entirely overwhelmed with Letterkenny’s tasteless charm and thusly totally paralyzed. 

As I consider best communication tactics to portray just how crucial consumption of this rather unlikely Sylv Fan Fav, really is I’m worried I might actually need to “hoover” a huge line of the “devil’s dandruff” to make it through. But if the hicks of Letterkenny have ambiguously taught me anything about casual cocaine use it is that its never a good look to indulge while sober. A lesson taught over a discussion about how much they loath Dan’s six year old cousin (this rivalry circles back in later seasons during a debate over wether or not having a little sister will sort small Samual out, a concept Wayne compares to a celebrity getting a puppy to help them get back on track “Seems like a backwards plan to me,” he says, “the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in my life is that a baby is smart.”) but I digress... why, Gentle Reader, is this six year old so awful?  Well, the hicks “Saw him snort a line of fun dip the other day.” That, they explain is a “Fun dip Dry rip,” or, when you do a line of schneef before you’ve ingested any booze to alter your judgement. A Dry rip, they warn is a sure sign you have a shneef problem. All the while Dary and Dan concede they did indulge themselves (back in their glory days).

I, however, absolutely refuse to let this blog result in a full blown shneef problem. Instead I’ll do as they do in this fictional little town of Letterkenny from which the show hails its namesake:

and “pitter patter, let’s get at ‘er...”

One caveat: while, I do not want to be completely crippled by comedy, here it wouldn’t be fair to assume that I, a California City Chic who by rule trends away from overtly crass humor can justifiably convey the genius which is Letterkenny, but let’s just try .. 

Most episodes open with landscape views of a very chilly looking Letterkenny and the note that there are 5,000 people in said town (hicks, skids, hockey players, christians and natives) and their problems.

While I’ve casually seasoned a line or two of dialogue throughout this blog I can’t actually adequately quote this show because (and this is important) the creators Jared Keeso and Jacob Tierney (and clearly the rest of the writing staff) are absolute MASTERS OF WORDPLAY and the actors’ timing is so pricelessly perfect that to even try to repeat most moments would be a gross injustice to the medium. 

This team of literary savants brilliantly twists puns (like when Wayne pours out the end of a warm beer Dan responds with “you have some kind of drinking problem? That theres alcohol abuse”), creates complex (and hilarious) characters with compelling, often sad (and hilarious) storylines, weaves interesting narratives, spews non-sequiturs, confronts factual yet controversial stereotypes, invokes compassion for both the absurd and the underdog, shamelessly polks fun at everything, including (but hardly limited to); politics, popular culture, sexual orientation, regions, races, origins, creeds other countries (like when Wayne explains the eating habits of our brethren “Malt vinegar is not a staple condiment on table tops in restaurants” Disgusted, the boys respond “Figure it out, somebody should really write a letter” but then concede, “They do have 6 kinds of Cap’n Crunch though”) and Ostrich Fuckers, all of this is done with sincere (and hilarious) honesty, a clever and often very nuanced style and all the while somehow managing to circle back to previous stories and quips sometimes so subtly that the untrained ear (or eye) might miss out. For example it is somehow terribly notable to me that we frequently find Dary eating small breakfasts’ with absurdly large spoons. 

Regardless of the approach, the through line remains constant: assorted misfit groups of friends flagrantly (and unapologetically) discuss every taboo thought that may (or may not) have ever crossed you or your pal’s mind (only you would have quickly squashed these ideas back down to the deep recesses of your Gentle Reader brain). They procure this unabashed and unapologetic honesty in a very, very fast Canadian dialect that is virtually incomprehensible at times (particularly in the earlier episodes as your ear adjusts to the style). And yet, as one American reviewer put it: I still get it, because I speak funny.

And this is why I genuinely believe no matter who you are or what your usual tastes may implicate if you too are fluent in the language of humor Letterkenny is just an absolute sure thing (given, of course a moment to adapt to the shows distinct language and stylings). 

At first it will probably seem just so stupid and gross but upon closer inspection it just might be the absolute most cleverly written show I’ve ever barely understood.

Kevin Tierney, another television journalist (and proud Poppa to one of the show’s writers and producers) put it best:

“...not to say the show is witless. On the contrary. It is an absolute festival of language, from the very, very local to the bizarrely idiosyncratic, especially when strung together by accents that are … well, different..”

He goes on to say this of the dialogue:

“...they might well change your whole sense of the scatological...”

And that really is the crux of it, isn’t it? So what, Gentle Reader, if it took me (a shamelessly proud California City Chic) until the third season to fully grasp the collective MO of each specific clique in this specific little town? Now I’ve gotten it and I did it with nary a fun dip dry rip in sight. What binds Letterkenny in their fast paced conversationally driven relationships with both their friends and foes was spelled out for all to understand when the dumb hockey players just out and said what I’d been attempting to put my finger on for months:

“Just pick a topic and beat the shit out of it.”

And this really can be any fucking topic from drug use to male models to working out one’s legs. With options just so limitless and with a well informed writing staff even the dumbest of topics are discussed with an odd sense of eloquence and, well... science.

Which is why even I don’t hate an entire episode entitled Fartbook in which the only subject explored for a full thirty minutes is the creation of a social network for your farts. And let’s face it, in the end is it really any worse than your face, Gentle Reader? Probably not.

To quote the farmers:

“No one cares about your cat’s farts.”

“Everyone who has a cat or a kid is going to think their farts are special and unique, they’re not.”

There are full minutes of dialogue spent categorizing snacks. Alphabetically. In verse. An important exercise executed in order to limit options (and thusly not overpack snacks for a fishing trip to Quebec) Dary and Dan have regaled themselves to foods only beginning with the letter C. When Katy questions the beer they quickly retort:

“Cold Beer.”

Obviously.

It is this ability to harp one subject until it is rendered all but useless and then find innovative ways to harp on it some more that defines the misfits of Letterkenny.

The town absolutely must create their very own euphemism dictionary. Or maybe they already have.

And while a fictional dictionary might be of some aid for us partially shutdown Northern Americans, subtitles won’t be. No matter! Consider this a genuine plea: please, please do not to give up before you’ve started! This show is a call for authenticity and friendship and it is looking like those are things all of our 2019s will need a lot of!

[iluvtv]

Hail Canada Part 2: The Only Thing Better Might Be A Julia Stiles-Athon

First of all, season four of Schitt’s Creek might just be the best one yet. For the past 3 years viewers have delighted as these characters have evolved from shallow, rich and whole heartedly self-centered humans into moderately less shallow, hard working, and occasionally compassionate ones. Through their process of growth we viewers too have evolved, slowly increasing our empathy for their foibles. Each character’s complex idiosyncrasies has become increasingly transparent and  four years after their comfortable lives were upended and they were forced up Schitts Creek, fans can see that they aren’t a family interested in just flailing along without a paddle.

While none of the Rose’s could be accused of executing their development with much grace or confidence they are, nonetheless, all marching forward. Alexis continues to pursue her education, allowing her social ambitions to take a back seat to her long term success. David is accepting his own vulnerability. Moira is clumsily attempting to offer genuine love and support to her friends and family and sweet John is rolling up his sleeves and executing real and actual teamwork. All four members of the Rose family are running their own increasingly successful businesses and all seem reluctantly aware that while squeezing into two bedrooms at a dingy motel is less than ideal, the love that fills their world now has only improved the lives they had while living in opulence.

In fact, (and I only say this because, well...it’s Hanukkah season and the Rose family is so fragrantly Jewish) the clan clearly represents the ancient Jewish narrative: The rug may have been ripped out from under us but through a bit of luck and grit (and of course being able to pass for white) we are able to scratch our way back up to success. 

There is absolutely no way I could do this remarkable season justice in just one blog so do yourself a favor and book a couple hours to get to know this charming family. This seriously is one of the best shows on television.  I literally love every single second of this show but perhaps my favorite story arc of season four was the intricacies of David’s first serious relationship. A squeamish, late blooming gay man who is so clearly new to love is just so darn relatable to my own personality. I can’t help but consider his screen time a bit of accidental humor therapy, if you will. All that being said, please don’t let my narcissism color your opinion of this lovely comedy couple. I’ll let you decide for yourself..

David's personality is best represented by his clear fear of love. His perpetual dramatics coupled with his tremendous mistrust of emotions (both his own and others) make for incredibly finicky antics resulting in a charming, highly relatable character. Particularly to humans  like me, who believe alcohol and drug use (recreational and otherwise) are a logical coping mechanism as opposed to others who believe in such insanity as emoting.

All that being said, the underlying story of season four is the evolution of the Rose's and as such, David's entrance into "real humanity" (beyond that previous silver-spoon reality-show-type existence in which he and his brood once lived) is coming to terms with being a healthy part of a couple.. The comical struggle here is nothing short of perfection. 

I probably could tell you every single amazing line he utters this season but I just won’t and instead here are a few stand out moments, most of which feature just how lovable an emotionally stunted narcissist can actually be. But, in the words of LaVar Burton, “You don’t have to take my word for it...”

To start, how about that time when Patrick comes clean that the kiss he shared with David at the end of season three was his first with a man, David admits that this kiss was a bit of a big deal on his end as well...

"This was first time I kissed someone I respected and thought was nice." 

(Just an FYI in case you were unclear, this is an ADULT man in his 30's!)

Or better yet, when Patrick and Stevie gang up on David for refusing to ever compromise and he points out that just last week he let Patrick choose the movie they watched:

Patrick: "You let me choose between two Sandra Bullock vehicles!"

To which David must assent that he in fact does suck at compromise, "Like Beyonce I excel as a solo artist and I was dressed by my mom well into my teens..." 

No matter, David stands by the fact that toilet plungers at the front of the store is clearly incorrect! (to which I say duh) leading to a tirade from David of everything he hasn’t yet mentioned that Patrick is doing horrible wrong, including his shoes. And while you, a healthy person who has had a few functional relationships may stop me here and say, “Sylv, this is a good time for Patrick to run for the hills,” I shake me head and say this is just the beginning of their true love! “But how?” you ask. Well by way of the put down David also refers to Patrick as his boyfriend. Both men are so thrown by this intentionally rude but also beautifully uninhibited step forward that they make out instead of continuing to argue. 

Now that’s romance!

And then there was that time when in an effort to beef up business at Rose Apothecary Patrick suggests hosting an open mic night. David responds to the very thought just as I would; with fabulous snobbery.

David: "I'm openly ill!"

Patrick insists it will help business and asks what's the worst that could happen? 

David: "The worst case scenario is I watch improv."

When Patrick moves forward with the idea anyhow (while also sharing his plan to perform at said mic) David's attitude shifts from negative to openly panicked. It is in this moment he says what I might argue to be the best line I heard in television in all of 2018: 

Voice dripping of sarcasm he states: "It's not scary or embarrassing to have the person you're dating sing at you with an acoustic guitar in front of people."

His fears are only exacerbated when Patrick reveals he will in fact be performing an original song! 

Yes David, I agree totally gross.

Patrick who is, in fact the perfect boyfriend for a man like David takes this rudeness in stride. “How so?” You ask. Well, continuing to trigger David's (clearly justified) nerves, of course. 

During the actual event David does what any sensible person would do, he drinks all the alcohol and hides in the corner with his mother (it’s easy to fade into the ether next to Moira, a notorious narcissist who fancies herself a famous actress). 

Mommy Dearest commiserates with her son’s crippling fears, "You are awfully brave allowing your beau to indulge like this."

 A woman of action, she offers to pull the fire alarm. And just as things seem to be taking a dark turn Patrick starts to perform and he is so unassumingly, wonderfully talented that the mood immediately shifts. David approaches the front of the crowd trying not to cry and Moira, unusually awed by a performance from someone other than herself, tells the Schitts: "My boy is being serenaded by his butter voiced beau." 

It is a wonderful call for hope (as it pertains to love). A novel idea, sure, but I'll stick with skepticism. Which, bear with me, might not be such a terrible idea as things really come to a head for the Rose children and their emotions in the barbecue episode. 

In what could be construed as a typical midseason trope, we find a complicated love conundrum as  David's struggle to accept requited love and Alexis' attempts to gracefully navigate the unrequited variety inadvertently collide. 

This episode flawlessly exemplifies exactly why opening your heart is just so freaking terrifying. From the terribly embarrassing (but sweet, I guess) enormous cookie frosted with the words “4 Months”, which is delivered to David in front of his entire family (I would probably literally die) to the family barbecue John decides to throw to celebrate his son's longest relationship ever, David’s ability to contain his disgust is bordering on non existent. 

Obviously, he rejects the very thought of the party, "I can't bring Patrick to a group of carnies eating burned meat," he nearly shrieks. To which our wise  matriarch calls out her son's pattern of rejection just as any mother would.

She warns,"You allowed your other relationships to prematurely oxidize because you can't embrace joy.”

That might be some sage motherly advice for us all to ruminate on in the new year. Thanks, Moira!

Anyhow, when David goes to chew out Patrick for the over the top cookie he is dissuaded from his attempts to skip over the very normal “four month anniversary” altogether by Patrick's suggestion of a date at "The Julia Stiles-athon" at the drive in.

                                              !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I mention this not because it really drives our plot or even any of my points but instead because I am just so thrilled by the very thought! Which I suppose does drive my point a bit after all; David and I might be the same person. Turns out even my mom is starting to come to terms with the fact that I might be a big gay man stuck in a woman’s tiny body.  

But back to the story at hand, Moira does eventually convince David to go through with the barbecue, pointing out that Patrick sees her son for all that he is.

"Let us celebrate that. And he's bringing his guitar." 

Even a narcissistic mother can appreciate what a special thing it is to be loved this way.

And so David reluctantly relents and agrees to the grilled meat party, "but I draw the line at a sing along!"

Happily ever after, right? 

Not so fast!

Here we are presented with said plot twist, when iIn a painful merging of storylines, Alexis's character development into humility and acceptance of her love of Ted as wholly unrequited manages to muck up David's struggle to accept both himself and more importantly his worthiness of others emotional attachment.

This surprise turn is too important and slightly too complicated for me to regale you with the details but suffice to say it doesn't end well and ultimately David runs out on both the barbecue and Patrick.

Irate he chastises Patrick for encouraging him to trust love."Not trusting people is my comfort zone." 

Amen brother.

As the season continues we follow the conflict of these two (wonderfully incompetent) men’s struggle as they work to finesse their way into a functional  relationship. This quest also leads to lovely and hilarious moments of equally incompetent support from David’s loved ones

In spite (or maybe because) of the cultivated cliches of these moments we watch David's growth include the acknowledgement of the platonic love which has so sweetly grown between himself and Stevie. At the tail end of a horrific vacation, the two share a food poisoning induced moment inside a very cheesy spa. 

"Historically speaking the more I revealed of myself the less interested people got," David admits.

As she tries to persuade David that Patrick just isn't that type of person she adds "And I still like you."

"I think you're like my best friend" he tells her.

It is then they both realize neither of them have ever actually had a best friend before.

"This would be a really sweet moment if it weren't so sad." He says as she dashes back to the loo.

I'll save myself the trouble and the inevitable nail biting spoilers by not revealing David’s (and the rest of the Rose family's) other fabulous self-deprecating and equally vain, neurotic one liners but suffice to say every single moment this season is amazingly quote-worthy. 

From a dating app named Bumpkin (an online social hub for rural singles) to a baby sprinkle ("that's the stupidest fucking thing I've ever heard”) watching the Roses claw their way to dignity year after year is a true delight. 

Thank you for your service Canada.

[iluvtv]

Hail Canada Part 1: Tackling Stereotypes through Television

When I was young I used to joke that I was racist against twins and Canadians. Twins still make me uncomfortable (sorry) but thanks to fairly progressive policies, a prime minister willing to get down with fun socks, a bit of an actual education in foreign affairs and most importantly, the import of really truly fabulous comedic television, I’ve decided to overlook the country’s seemingly endless smiles,‘eh. I have come around on our Northern neighbors.

I suppose it all started with guilty Thanksgiving binge sessions of Degrassi the Next Generation with my 6 year old sister (I was 19-- so I’m not sure exactly which one of us was in the inappropriate age demographic here). While fun and excellent bonding, let’s be honest... admittedly addictive sure, this teen soap (even with Drake’s excellent dramatic flair from a wheelchair) had pretty much the exact opposite affect of flipping my narrow-minded idealogical philosophies. Hours wasted, I still whole-heartedly believed the entire country was altogether way too sweet and friendly to bother with. Shamefull as it feels to say now I’m certain I eventually flipped the remote to Season One of The Apprentice, blissfully unaware that what I found comedically enlightening in 2003 might one day cause a tariff situation jeopardizing the true hilarity yet to come out of a little part of what we then knew as NAFTA.

My next love affair with Canadian Programming came along in a time similar to now, also rife with drama and fear; 2011! You may recall this summer as a terrifying time for television. Oh yes, the Hollywood writers strike! Before writers could just run off and make a million dollars at Netflix we were all shackled to LA unions (ok I’m a poser here; I was living in the mountains writing about regional plays and dances for 10 cents a word) and yet because programming on cable was looking a little thin a  fabulous show  premiered in the US. Being Erica was enough to convince me that there might be some cool people to our North. And while my 24 year old self was utterly obsessed  (I do suggest everyone who loves Younger to indulge -- it is simultaneously very good and delightfully Semitic and oddly Sci Fi) it still wasn’t enough to convince me the country itself actually possessed a cool factor. 

 Then something shifted. A few years ago Eugene Levy and his genetic spawn decided to give my bigotry a run for it’s money with the terribly awesome Schitt’s Creek. Success! Turns out Canada could be interesting and better yet subversive! And then this year it got even better! LetterKenny entered my intellectual landscape, truly putting my ignorance to shame. With the fourth season of Schitt’s Creek finally available on Netflix and two seasons of LetterKenny up on Hulu, us State Siders can indulge in our very desperate need for absolute sheer joy and laughter this season. Once you’ve gotten your fill of happiness you can curl up on the couch and feel sad that we still have 2 more years of that guy who used to host The Apprentice running our country, while our Neighbors up North gets a Prime Minister who wears rainbow pride socks that say “Eid Murback” (to celebrate both Pride and Ramadan simultaneously), and  LetterKenny and Schitt’s Creek will premier Christmas Specials and new seasons which we will inevitably have to wait years to stream easily. Yup, don’t worry, that was almost enough to get me hating on Canada again too.

But first let’s celebrate their sheer genius in satire! And since I’ve learned no one has time to read another encyclopedic novel from me, be it on Foreign Affairs or Breakfast I’ll break this one into separate posts. Think of it as my season of giving... It’s almost as good as an advent calendar (or is it? I’m Jewish I don’t know these things...)

[iluvtv]

Comedy in the Tragedy

I’ve always fancied myself a bit of a student of comedy. This fascination is of course why my love and adoration of I’m Dying Up Here and particularly its anti-heroine matriarch, Goldie  was totally unsurprising. It may piss the comics off that she’s not interested in paying them. I can see how when your boss claims the opportunity to perform is like college might ruffle your feathers, but as an outsider I just want to write down every gem of knowledge out of Melissa Leo’s raspy, wise-ass mouth. After two seasons of this Showtime series which is based on the book, based on the real life of 70′s comics in the LA scene (particularly Mitzi Shore and The Comedy Store) I have no notes just lists and lists of quotes. 

Here are some delightfully sad words of wisdom from the funny people...

“If I had a dick I might stand around holding it all day but I don’t so I have a chance to actually get shit done” 

“Love or insanity?”                                                                                      “What’s the difference?”                                                                                  “One you do with your eyes open the other with them shut.”

“People make better decisions drunk than they do in relationships”

“I got some this great Bolivian shit from my PA if you’re into it...”                     “Take me to your mirror!”

“The people you love will kill you either by making you stay or leaving you.”

“You need to get off your butt and do it because dream is a verb young man”

On humor: “I’m serious though, anything that keeps shit at bay is a gift. Laughing... it’s like amnesia”

“They say that adversity shapes us. Molds us. But in the case of abuse it just warps.”

“You’re a victim of human nature. I’m a student of it.“

On AA: “This amends shit was always about me acting as the middle man for his own forgiveness”

There is so much more but mostly I was too consumed and overwhelmed to pause and write anything down.

This show is wonderful. Raw, funny, very sad and absolute design pornography to a girl obsessed with the orangey glow of the disco era. I don’t suggest dipping your toes in when you are feeling especially emotionally vulnerable but I can’t imagine a human who couldn’t find something to love here.

[iluvtv]

Political Power Outage

We all know there is plenty to be outraged about these days. But I think it’s high time to make a vote for joy!

Maybe it’s feeling decidedly grown up while possessing very, very little responsibility. Maybe its the shit-storm that is the world and my very tiny confidence that there is much hope to cling to (I’ll try for a moment to muffle my cynicism here and at least make a rah of enthusiasm for the assumed effectiveness of Ms. Pelosi paired with the newly vacated Sessions). Maybe it’s just my nature. No matter what induces it I increasingly seem to give about zero fucks beyond my commitment to having and spreading this emotion.

JOY.

And when my own humor fails there’s more good TV than I know what to do with. If the apocalypse is near I hope the last thing that crashes at my house is the cable line and streaming services. This way I can at least sneak some uninterrupted guilt-free time to beat my way through at least like 20% of what’s  left on “the list.”

It’s not all jaw droopingly perfect (admittedly some of my most frequent followings are viewed through a somewhat evil eye whilst reading the news) but there’s just enough bullshit on all of our periphery to make even the most basic satire hard to truly fuck up.

Case in point: Modern Family (am I seriously not only still watching but still publicly talking about this show?! — If you don’t watch don’t start and I’ll be brief here, but….). This sitcom which was cutting edge when it premiered is now mainly sleepy and rather cliche. There’s a moment early in this season where Hailey actually says to a large black woman “thanks girl, your hair’s on point!” to which I was so baffled by I took to #blacktwitter in hopes of some dialogue on this exchange  only to realize black people don’t seem to bother with Modern Family #smarterthantheJews? (like how I managed to marginalize and generalize two “kinky-haired” minorities right there? Clearly I’m learning from the fine folks running our country these days...)

But my vote’s for joy so let’s address more positive matters; despite all odds Modern Family has still managed to take on White Boy Privilege with a delightful bit of charm (and underlying vitriol)…

The week of October 5th (noteworthy in as much as it aired during the Kavenaugh hearings) Modern Family ran it’s second episode of its 10 year  (and I assume finale) run with a certain je ne sais quois… not entirely shocking but certainly on par with my zero fucks ‘tude . When Jay wonders why Phil is being so rude to him Luke looks at his grandfather and earnestly retorts “I dunno, but its not easy being a white man these days. You feel me?” And yes, I do believe this line was written in at the very last minute as the Trump Boys raged against the machine (aka crazy women making it “so dangerous to be men these days”).

Similarly, when Alex wonders if she should continue her lifetime pursuit of a science fellowship or change career paths and become a singer she considers the money she’d be giving up.

Alex: “I could make half a million my first year out of school.”

To which her Grandfather wisely replies: “Wow, what are they paying male scientists these days?!”

In other “sitcoms that once broke the mold and now barely blip the controversy radar” news, Will and Grace took on the once taboo topic of sexual harassment with an avant garde “grace” I had yet to witness from network comedy. Last week Grace confronted her father for not knowing just how skeezy his bestfriend had been to her when she was in High School and even more to the point assuming that she had been the one at fault when the summer job she’d had for this man had gone sour. Unfortunately, the “inappropriate old man” experience is all too universally relatable and the layered approach to Grace’s trauma some 30 years later combined with her father’s eventual apology was a fabulously welcome and important commentary. But if all that’s too heavy for your bliss Karen’s lip synching to the Wicked Witch of the West Monologue will 100% make this episode worth it. 

Moving past the predictable sitcoms that are either ready to be retired or are newly resurrected is TV making me far happier. Since we can’t all get work visas and escape to Canada I guess you’ll have to settle on your couch for a few Canadian exports. First and foremost, Letterkenny, a special little satire I’d been planning on getting to for months. This show along with the Netflix debut of season 4 of Schitt’s Creek are so special they deserve a HAIL CANADA blog all their own so we’ll save them for a rainy day. Suffice to say they make me very, very happy. And if you too need joy run to them with open arms.

Speaking of shows worthy of quoting literally every line their genius writing staff composes (and fabulous actors deliver) while also being completely unafraid to address pretty much every single ‘Merica terror -- I finally got around to the first half of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt’s season 3. As per usual Tina Fey produces popular culture and political commentary entirely on the nose while still being rib achingly funny. I mostly appreciate that this show is entirely willing to offend everyone. As a human largely offended by politics as a whole I find this a hugely relatable and fantastic tactic.

Like in the season premier when sweet little innocent Kimmy, victim of years of captivity gets a sexual harassment suit filed on her (been there girl!)

Titus explains to Kimmy there is a reckoning going on even though she’s not “a Weinstein or the president” she still needs to watch her step.

“It’s not about you it’s about your coworkers.”

Advice we all need.

Or, when lily white, baby boomer, radical Lilian sits on her Brooklyn stoop  drinking malt liquor, holding her late husband’s ashes and lamenting to a young ethnic kid about gentrification her brown neighbor pushes back. The shift is lucrative for him: “I’ve gone from selling rock to powder.”

This is humor offensive on a bipartisan level, right?

The cleverness hardly stops at episode one though so don’t wait until the world is ending and all the power goes out (no please no!!!) sit down and get compfy, this may be the best season yet!

Just a quick PSA, do be wary of getting sucked into Netflix’s next recommendation. Algorithms aren’t nearly as wonderful as my suggestions. Just take Titus’ word for it...

“You know how Al Gore invented internet? He also invented a rhythm for it. It’s named for him and it learns about you and picks things you like.”

I die.

And to go completely off brand here I’d be especially remiss if I failed to mention one of my greatest TV joys these days: Meghan McCain’s return to The View! As a rather unlikely fan I suppose I’m just compassionate enough to appreciate the lengthy time the network allotted McCain to take to grieve “The Maverick” but good golly am I overjoyed to have the betch back at the table. Truthfully, I’m pretty enamored with the whole cast and their lively dynamic (how refreshing to listen to smart women respectfully discussing real issues — the empathy they bring to the current rhetoric is sorely hard to come by)! All cast considered, there is something marvelous about this girl who was raised so differently than me, with such different political ideals and yet I still just feel so connected to. She is an incredibly intelligent, well read, self-actualized bad girl. She speaks her opinions with conviction and poise and even though I mostly disagree with the sentiment I so aspire to argue with that kind of eloquence and confidence. I look forward to sipping a thimble of gin with her as I cook  dinner each night. Here’s to you (and your Pops) Ms.McCain! God knows the more divisive the country gets the more I rely on these women!

And if all that wasn’t enough my new satire god R. Eric Thomas (if you aren’t subscribing to his weekly email you fail at life) actually tweeted that my new Schitt’s Creek election t-shirt was “perfect”.

I guess we all can see satire was the real winner this (and every) week!

[iluvtv]

Don’t Bother Me I’m Working...

Lately I’ve been complicating an idea past the point of focus. In creating an endless means of procrastination I have been sitting back and letting this little project percolate slowly within my ether... 

No more!

It all started while exploring the comedic intricacies within the fictional televised family. Afterward, I zeroed in on situational comedies set in the workplace and was certain I had something to say on the matter. Finding one’s own intellect a fabulous reason to endlessly put off a project I spent most of summer ruminating, studying and mostly just watching humor "at-work”. After carefully reviewing the genres’ common characteristics I decided that while much of workplace comedy is comprised of sheer silliness it also inevitably trends toward absurdist (even on the most mainstream of platforms). There is a playful advantage taken to the fact that everyone works with insane (and often asshole) characters. Sly comedic writers utilize this assumption as an easy pretense. They prey on such extremes. With this idea in my pocket I had all but formulated a thesis focused on the very most random of comedic moments. I gathered quotes and notes and was all but ready to get to writing (procrastinating) a blog about workplace comedies and what I had deemed to be a "dramatic aside" when I figured a little research on the aside itself might not be such a bad idea.

Bingo!

Lo and behold I was not even remotely accurate in my employment of this word.

Whoops.

A bit of an embarrassing loophole, huh? So, while I might have to write about asides one day (after 34 years and a Bachelor of Arts in Literature I can confidently use the term sans ignorance) a new feat was left for me to tackle. I now had to seek out an education in literary dramatic terminology; a rather aimless effort to pinpoint the exact word to describe the aforementioned quotes and notes for which I had so painstakingly assembled. A bit of prodding led me to the dramatic digress -- which, in part, is the point I was gunning for. However, while this idea did lead me to this lovely article from a decade ago, the term, unfortunately, did not cover my idea in its entirety.

Finding little solace in my aforementioned degree. (I blame myself, your gorgeous redwoods, sunny beaches and awesome drugs, Santa Cruz -- not your educational institution itself which I'm sure was just swell could I have been bothered.) I next turned to my friends (mostly and usually, Mother) whom had majored in the far more practical course work of drama. While they seemed to know what I meant (’a sidebar of sorts?’ Mom suggested) their actual ability to provide a thesaurus for my vague description was as vacuous as my own. All but ready to throw in the towel a muse started to whisper and I remembered eons ago when I was a child and my imagination still worked in full-force. 

So, with my creative fitness  presently below par, it seems there may be no better time than today to start flexing. Fuck this research bullshit -- the Internet has provided far too many time sucks-- I can mutha fucking make up my own word! 

Fortunately, while I sifted through what I deemed the most noteworthy moments of workplace comedies to air last year, I was equally moved by a summer love of the same form, the second season of Trial and Error. While not quite as good as Season One (Chenoweth is great but she's just no Lithgow) I do understand the purpose behind switching up the storyline and appreciate its deep ceded commitment to satirizing the omnipresent murder anthology series in both its television and now podcast forms. Particularly fortunate for me (and this blog) is each episode's supply of very obscure historical "facts" on the backwards little (fictional) place where this show is set. The Southern town of Peck and it's residents comprised of "Peckerheads" offers endless creative inspiration. If Trial and Error writers can come up with this many arbitrary facts to ascribe an imaginary place, I can certainly come up with just one! As the East Coast Lawyer (re: token Jew), Josh so eloquently says after yet  another town-history lesson from his dim witted assistant, Dwayne Reed: “And none of this makes any sense unless you live here, but..."

So let’s move in and explore these comedies together. By the end of this blog I'm sure we can all settle on a fabulous new term, tantalizing drama nerds, tv enthusiasts and the fine staff at Merriam and Webster's alike. 

Workplace comedies are generally my favorite. From NewsRadio, to Better off Ted,  to Parks and Rec, to Cheers, these shows stand the test of time for many reasons but foremost in my mind are hilarious recurring moments which do everything to drive characters and theme while doing absolutely nothing for the storyline itself. These plotless moments are a very accurate mirror for comedy in one's own reality. Real life comedy generally exists within confines of one’s own humor. Lacking wit-speed dialogue and perfect punch lines we have come to rely instead on the random habits of human existence for catharsis. This is why the best laughter always comes with on team member at another’s expense.  In turn, frequent non-sequiturs are a requisite and relatable sprinkle of a workplace sitcom’s subplot, storyline digress, and character quirk. All of this dashed atop one's proverbial TV dinner is just so darn essential to life. These moments, varying in diversity from serialized in-house commercials featuring the hopelessness of human existence (Better off Ted) to employing Joan Didion puns as pick up lines (LA to Vegas) are just like real life. If, of course, we all had a few coked up writers sprucing up our dialogue.The point is, these are the moments you might miss both in reality and on the small screen if you aren't simultaneously paying attention and in possession of a terribly wonderful sense of humor. Without these traits you surely can function and probably even follow along but you just aren't really worth my time. I have the good fortune (and grit) to facilitate both these traits while at work and whilst basking in the glow of the "small"screen (but who are we kidding all our tv's are massive in diameter these days). So, for those of you who don't have the time (or just can't be bothered) here are some of my most favorite moments from last season's most network-y workplace comedies. For now I’ll leave my coworkers out of it.

I'm sure most of you missed all of these shows, but I'm happy to fill in as your "blue collar watcher liaison". Meanwhile you stay highbrow with your Stranger Things and Game of Thrones....

Somehow remaining relatively under the radar, Superstore came in strong for season three (Season four premiered last night). In what one might call a remarkable rarity, the show kept up a subversive punch through a full and classic 21 network season. If any show is going to do it there is little surprise that it's a comedy with Office Alum genius' behind its creation. Here's  a little blog proving that Superstore is the Office's natural successor (as if I had any doubts). 

Superstore does follow a few very interesting (and politically important) storylines. America Ferrera is using this platform and a new book to encourage you all to get out and vote next month -- just do it!

Beyond its willingness to tackle some of today's most emotionally fraught debates (immigration, abortion, disabilities...) with an undeniable sardonic wit, this show can be fun in just sheer randomized silliness. One of my very favorite parts of Superstore are  the in-store customer interludes. While these very funny moments do nothing for the plot itself, they do outline (and underline) the sheer absurdity of human nature (and how we  behave in public, where we so often feel oddly confident that no-one is watching). These moments are perfectly paired with catchy pop music from our elder millennial youth which of course inevitably plays in every single shopping chain across the nation now. 

While many workplace comedies prey on the oddness of our co-workers, any sitcom featuring the service industry from Are You Being Served to Always Sunny in Philadelphia the customers are equally fair game. Superstore wonderfully follows suit. The interludes are not always customer-specific but  they are frequently the highlight. I'll just mention a few...

A customer taking a bite of a scented candle while Britney's Not So Innocent plays on the loudspeakers

A sign advertising the store's new toy: "Try our 3D printer. No Dildo's Please."

During the Halloween episode the story is interrupted to show  a man dressed as a baby, shopping with a baby in his hand basket, dressed as a man. 

An older Asian sales associate putting up a sign on an apple display which boasts the fruit’s improvement of sexual performance (while rap from 2002 blasts). Later in the episode the same associate is shown taking that sign down only to replace it with one simply stating: "Ecoli".

A woman changing her baby's diaper (and hiding the old one behind the cheetos) while Green Day's Basket Case, plays (accurate).

An equally rude woman using the bulk food scoop to pour granola directly into her mouth.

Ladies Night playing while a mom weighs her baby on the produce scale.

An employee dusting the inside of a puppet.

During the Mother's Day episode we notice an underwear display featuring a pair of sexy undergarments reading Number One Mom.

A customer taking ice cream out of their shopping cart and leaving it on a shelf in electronics. A few scenes later we see ice cream melting all over the store's headphones....

Sure, none of these moments offer any momentum to Superstore's plot but amidst Christian abortion jokes, a black paraplegic character refusing to be profiled, deportation and a guy trying to get rich selling home-made breast milk cheese (and many other taboo topics) these are just the kind of necessary comedic breaks we all might forget to pay attention to.

Meanwhile...

AP Bio made its debut this Spring and it looks to be slated for another season. Do tune in! Glen Howerton and Patton Oswalt head up an all-star cast and there is a fantastic onslaught of comedic celebrity guest spots (including Niecy Nash who should just absolutely never be missed). The whole show is a totally heartwarming, harsh, silly and hilarious take on what it means to succeed in the world of academia and how we all measure our own self worth. 

Howerton plays Jack, an Ivy League Ethics Professor whose bizarre fall from grace has led him to “teaching” AP Bio in his hometown. While his staunch refusal to teach Biology infuriates his loveably annoying nerdy High School students, it is his lessons in Ethics which drives the show. 

Feeling lost? A few words of wisdom from Jack can help:

On job interviews: “If you don’t lie someone else will so It’s fine. It’s called holistic consequentialism.” 

On  High School relationships: "You have your whole life to worry about dating. Right now you should focus on masturbating."

But there's so much random silliness to love in this series beyond the classroom...

Patton Oswalt, playing the school’s sweet and desperate Principal Durbin, has a tendency to have animated bouts of sleep walking in which he wanders the house freeing slaves by way of the underground railroad (because doesn't everyone have a friend who has live abolitionist dreams at slumber parties?). 

Jack’s complacency in living in his dead mother's floral wallpapered, handicapped equipped, china tchotchke filled home, all the  while lounging in her very short rose-print robe. 

Somehow his sadness is so entitled and endlessly comedic that it is not even slightly reminiscent of Psycho. 

Needless to say there are plenty of "non-plot-driving" moments which deserve mention and will inevitably make you laugh but my personal favorite has got to be the gossipy gaggle of teachers. 

We mostly find these women being brutally honest in their staff lounge and while they're always a hoot and a holler,  with such quotables as: “Today I’m going to make kids draw flattering pictures of me and give to their dads,” what really seals the deal for me is their eating habits. 

The teacher's are inconspicuously always consuming an enormous Tupperware filled with fruits and vegetables. While I've never actually worked as a teacher this just seems like such a classic attempt at "health." Food actually is a recurring topic in and of itself (the apple Jack brings to class everyday but never takes more of a bite of, the argument for sinful treats in the school vending machine to mention a few) but something about the subtlety of these epic Tupperware’s always filled with a "healthy snack," never cease to make me chuckle. Sometimes we even catch a glimpse of two teacher BFFs sharing a salad out of a Tupperware "built for three."

And if you aren’t sold by the massive portions of grapes, the writing staff found another way to appeal to all us elder millenial’s. The genius’ over there threw in an episode featuring Lisa Loeb, who in a madcap series of events (orchestrated of course by Jack and his class) assumes her boyfriend is cheating on her with Alanis Morissette. She subsequently destroys said  boyfriend's house, and then end the episode in a full blown make-up scene while "Stay (I Missed You)." plays in the background. 

I. Shit. You. Not. 

And FYI this is scarcely the only 90's popular music reference. Viewer beware, between this and Superstore enough nostalgia may be generated to whip out all your favorite old mix tapes. In fact, all of this is just enough to make one start to feel slightly "middle aged" But rather go down that rabbit hole of despair, I'll further whet your AP BIO appetite. After all, most of my favorite network shows got cancelled last season and I'm eager to get the masses to fall in love with this one. 

Here are few other priceless and only slightly sexual non-sequiters to entice: 

AP Bio Student to her parents: “I’m old enough to get an hpv vaccine but not to have my own pressure cooker? I want to cook brisket and I want to cook it fast”

Principal Durbin on the school's sexual education program: "the only thing we’re allowed to say about condoms is they’re 2% ineffective and everyone stares at you when you buy them”

The last show I must mention, LA to Vegas, sadly got cancelled after it's debut season last spring. I get it. There is so much good TV out there, it's easy for silly sitcoms to fall under the radar.  That being said, four months have passed since my first viewing and I am still quoting scenes and referencing moments to confused strangers. The stickiness of its humor lends hope  that one day this show might make a bit of a comeback as a cult classic.

What this show did so well is consistently remind us that the best TV is always ensemble TV.

One unsurprising factor to this impeccable teamwork is Will Ferrell served as series executive producer. Generating hilarity within a group is something this man just excels at. A true comedy genius in his own right, his often very masculine performances somehow dodge ego. This is sadly noteworthy as it is generally unprecedented in the comedy world. Ferrell consistently brings joyful humor to the masses, all the while building up (and onto) his fellow cast.

But I digress...

The show's premise is simple. Each week we follow a flight crew and their regular commuters on their weekly trip from LA to Vegas and back. Most of the series takes place on the terrible fictional budget airline, Jackpot.

When we meet the lead flight attendant, Ronnie (played perfectly by the fabulous Kim Matula) she is hopeful a better job on Delta is about to come through. "I need to be on a real airline where people aren't just here to cheat on their wives and buttsmuggle Molly."

She of course does not get the job.

And that's really the crux of this show. The funniest parts polarize all that is terrible with this country and yet in that cuddly way that is endlessly endearing .

When we meet the Captain Dave (Dylan McDermott) he explains "My job isn't to fly the plane it's to connect with passengers."

From scenes of an entire flight having a sing along to hava nagila, to endless jokes on the classiness of Bakersfield California, the obscure punchlines here are just  terribly priceless.

Here's a few standout moments (so you can write your congresswoman with a renewal request):

"I smoked my first Marlboro Red at my third birthday party... What?! My family was a little trashy, I grew up near Bakersfied."

"I can make us Bakersfield Mary's" (confused? Don't be! Ronnie explains they consist of vodka and ketchup).

When the group is rewarded NPR totes the Russian commuter describes them as: "Socialist gift bags"

The wonderfully and stereotypically gay black flight attendant, Bernard (Nathan Lee Graham) offers his laments....

On the the demise of air travel: " Look at what we've become! Judy Garland once said the best bowel movement in her life was one she had after eating a salmon mousse on a TWA flight to Paris."

Or, his gripes on passengers' behavior "tiny white women have no idea how much trouble they are."

(I like to think he was referring to me here.)

And best of all the current state of wealth in America: "I used to love meeting rich people, now they're all just nerds riding fold up bicycles." (factual)

And  then there is Captain Dave's opinion on the current state of food limitations in America: "When I was a kid there were no allergies, just swollen days and unswollen days."

If you do nothing else, at least log onto Hulu and watch the episode which aired over Easter week, featuring Bernard's Jesus Christ Superstar birthday party. It is possibly the most agnostic, and satirical network holiday special I have ever had the good fortune to witness (there's a few Evangelical jabs in there too but I'll stay out of that wildfire).

At the end of the day though, unlike our real lives (thanks politics) it's the love not the hatred which drive these shows. The casts’ may all be slightly awful but deep down they are all just trying to survive. The support they offer one another as the rest of the world looks down their noses at them truly represents how we all feel about those people we accidentally end up spending our lives with.

So, a big cheers to our work families. Hate 'em or love 'em somehow we all end up getting even the craziest one's backs. Perhaps it's all those absurd, non-sequiter, routinely predictable moments which work provides that supply the endless comedic relief necessary in making "adulting" tolerable. God knows the paycheck certainly isn't enough!

And so, I'll go off-brand here and be sweet. Let's dub my term "Love Dash" because it is this necessary but frequently forgotten flavor that makes even the fictional workday worthwhile!

[iluvtv]

“I Sleep in a Bed but I’m Homeless” and other contradictions in terms

Last month Donald Glover curated a media moment. He hosted Saturday Night Live while his alter ego Childish Gambino simultaneously appeared as the musical guest. All the while (to much social media fanfare) he dropped a music video chock full of divisive commentary on racism in America. In my opinion this wonderfully creative and crucial social commentary rattled the masses far more than I think they should have. I'm startled by the possibility that one could "be here now” and still be surprised that This is America.

Point being though, that during a spring weekend’s naughtiest hours in 2018 Glover did what he did best — worked. And in doing so his art (as it is wont to do) challenged us. In just a little over and hour this legendary genius gave us everything he has to offer. He made us laugh, taught us something and kept up his now signature cocky air. Reaffirming that while he will provide his brilliance for us to share and learn from it is not exactly for us.

In an incredible New Yorker interview by the fabulous Tad Friend earlier this year Glover explains; “If ‘Atlanta’ was made just for black people, it would be a very different show. But I can’t even begin to tell you how, because blackness is always seen through a lens of whiteness—the lens of what white people can profit from at that moment. That hasn’t changed through slavery and Jim Crow and civil-rights marches and housing laws and ‘We’ll shoot you.’ Whiteness is equally liquid, but you get to decide your narrative.” For the moment, he suggested, white America likes seeing itself through a black lens. “Right now, black is up, and so white America is looking to us to know what’s funny.”

But before we go that deep, early in that SNL episode there was his monologue. Through this caricature of himself Glover pokes fun at the man he presents in this interview. By claiming there is  "nothing he can't do" while failing at everything, subsequently puking into a clarinet and repeatedly bringing up his rejection from SNL  many careers ago, he delivers audiences a humbler version of himself. This is notable because even if the farce is egotistical what he's actually playing is failure. Was this by a cast writer's design to mock his arrogance or did he write every word himself?

Neither would surprise me. After greedily consuming Atlanta’s first season (Hulu why must you wait so long to give me new FX seasons?) and then studying the media image Glover presents I see he is his own anomaly.

Confident, worried, scared, brave, untouchable and sensitive. Through his thoughtful creativity he has (for the most part) been given permission to be whomever he wants.

We all will agreeably, eagerly (and even gluttonously) accept all of it.

He didn’t always believe this would be possible. When he first pitched Atlanta he was certain this wouldn’t be the case at all but FX surprised him. In the New Yorker interview the producers explain:

“The parts that you’re worried we’re going to think are too weird—lean into those.”

From its onset I suppose Atlanta can be read as sad. A sort of devastating drama on race and poverty and violence. And while this is clearly a trap story there is  an almost inexplicable, deep seeded sense of satire that feels both simultaneously impossible to pinpoint or ignore.

In imagery and experiences (which more often than not trend more towards metaphors than reality) Atlanta challenges me. I just can’t get enough but I also can't help but feel like most of the time I don't totally get it. And this is just the tip of the iceberg in the long series of anomalies which like Glover himself comprise Atlanta. At the end of the day am I just too white, slightly too old (and more to the point un -hip) or was this confusion just the purpose?

FX Chief John Landgraf explains to the New Yorker, “Donald and his collaborators are making an existential comedy about the African-American experience, and they are not translating it for white audiences.”

There is a consistent underlying dichotomy in all of Atlanta's odd stories and part of it I suppose is an assumed understanding between the white coastal viewer and Glover that we are only partially in on the joke.

Presenting this dichotomy, Atlanta begins introducing Earn (Glover) and Van’s (Zazzie Beetz) relationship which while terribly charming is equal parts fleeting.  Seconds into a relaxed and loving scenes their relationship just as quickly turns contentious.

We watch this pattern repeat again and again.

The pilot episode continues in this vein introducing relationship dynamics before revealing a storyline or history.

We meet Earn’s fed up parents. Friendly enough but annoyed that their adult son is always asking for money, oh and also that he doesn't flush.

Earn: "That wasn't me."

Mom: "That was you. I checked. You better start eating some real food and not all these candies and cookies..."

We are introduced to my favorite character, Darius (Lakeith Stanfield) wearing only an apron while baking cookies. He also has guns and a butcher knife.

We witness the first of many racial power dynamics as Earn takes his cousin Alfred’s (Brian Tyree Henry) tape to a white DJ “buddy”, hoping if he can get Al’s alter ego Paperboi radio time he'll be able to convince his cousin to give him work representing Paperboi. It is here we see some dumb white kid front as though he is "hard" using language he would never use in front of any black man he found intimidating. Because Earn is not intimidating. In the face of this obnoxious DJ Earn is unassuming, friendly and essentially desperate all the while ignoring the terrible behavior of a stereotypical white millennial’s crude attempt to impress his "nigga" while completely refusing to throw Earn a bone by spinning Paperboi's first single. It is noteworthy throughout this season just how child like un-intimidting the character Glover has created for himself is. 

Later when Earn manipulates things in his own favor he asks an older black janitor if this rude white DJ has ever said "nigga" in front of him.

The janitor is stunned by the very thought!

But this is who Earn is. Friend describes it as such: “Atlanta” broke rules that most viewers hadn’t quite realized were rules. In comedies, jokes are underlined by closeups, but Atlanta’s camera stayed aloof, serving not as an exclamation point but as a neutral bystander. The characters didn’t have histrionic reactions to the problem of the week; they just gave up a little more. Earn was an antihero, as is now customary, but, unlike Don Draper or Walter White or Olivia Pope, he wasn’t an expert in anything. He wasn’t a great manager or a great part-time boyfriend or, for that matter, a particularly promising human being. Curiously boyish in shorts and a backpack, he wasn’t even active, the minimal standard for television characters. He didn’t seem to do or want anything. He just watched and flinched and got yelled at to grow up.”

The episode ends with the show's first of many very obvious forays into existential surrealism. The way Atlanta plays with fantasy is very fresh and new and brave and often completely impossible to fully comprehend forcing me to wonder why I only took a handful of philosophy courses in college?

But aren’t those courses just an antidote of the privileged white youth’s confusion?

That and marijuaina.

Again, Friend  addresses this discussing Glover's complete willingness to fail where other black television revolutionaries are wary.

“This sensibility is singular yet recognizable. Just as John Cheever’s epiphanies and apologias were stamped by drink and Paul Bowles’s hallucinatory quietude by hashish, so “Atlanta” ’s vibe is molded by weed. There’s a goofiness to the action, a dreamy awareness that reality is untrustworthy right now, but hold up, try this edible. Recognizing that quality, Lakeith Stanfield told me, “I decided to play Darius as a high version of myself. And now he’s become all the fantastical elements of Atlanta condensed into one person—this gateway to Freakville.”

Half way through the pilot we find Earn on a bus with his sleeping daughter opening up to a well dressed black man in a suit about feeling like a loser. "Am I just there to make things easier for winners?”  he asks.

The man sits listening patiently on this bus seat, all the while making a Nutella sandwich. "Just a symptom of the way things are," he explains to Earn "actual victor belongs to those who simply do not seek failure."

He forces a bite of his chocolate bus sandwich on Earn and then just as quickly disappears, only the tub of Nutella remains.

And abruptly the episode closes where it began, realizing the reason why the first scene was so confusing is only because it was actually the end. None of these characters were lying or being intentionally evasive, rather the drama which opened Atlanta had not yet ensued. And while it is still rather unclear, on some level even the whitest and most sheltered kids (those who can comfortably say the N word around very specific audiences) understand this rhetoric just enough and those who grew up in the trap world of Atlanta could probably write their philosophy dissertations on the scene.

As an audience we continue to ride out their drama into episode two. Conveniently, the coinciding moments of Alfred's arrest and his radio debut have vaulted him to instant fame all while housed in the relatively newsless space of jail.

When Darius comes to bail him out even the cops ask if they can pose for selfies with Paperboi. A beautiful moment of social commentary on race, class and most importantly fame.

Meanwhile, not-famous and mostly useless Earn stays stuck in jail which lends itself to one of the saddest satirical series of scenes I have ever seen. Think  Orange Is The New Black but really, really funny or maybe really, really miserable and also just so exactly where any of us (even the more privileged white girls) might end up for a few hours after a really, really bad night.

Fortunately I never have but I will take Atlanta at it's (sur)real(ist) word.

When Earn is told by the guard he cannot sleep he is baffled.

“Everyone sleeps."

To which he is told, "If you wanted to sleep you should have thought about that before you came to jail."

This dysfunction is further magnified by the token insane guy who apparently gets locked up on a near weekly basis. While his absolutely pathological behavior at first prompts laughs from the rest of the men waiting in lock-down they also  all just sit there and quietly watch as the guards kick his ass and drag him off to solitary.

To the repeat offenders this is normal behavior.

Earn, like myself seems less comfortable with this violence.

Meanwhile, Alfred due to newfound Paperboi fame is suffering his own violent satire.

On a walk through his projects he sees a kid with a toy gun shooting at his friends. They are playing a game of pretend in which the male child is Paperboi.

Alferd observes this. The kid, through clear admiration of his alter ego pretends to shoot down his little girlfriend. She feigns death just as the children's mother comes out to yell at the children, asserting to these small black bodies that they should "just say no to guns"

Overwhelmed, and clearly experiencing a myriad of emotions from the last 24 hours Al approaches the family and argues to the children that "shooting people ain't cool." At first the mother is stand-offish and annoyed at his presence but once he admits he is the very same rapper whom they are make-believing about the mood shifts. Instantaneous hilarity ensues as she is suddenly very interested in this infamous man. Momma comes on hard posing Al with the family for photographs. She is genuine comic relief "now one with my head on yo chest," she says as she snuggles in. And even Al who was out for a walk to escape the fresh madness his single has suddenly created seems calmed -- his comfort level with being viewed as violent has shifted now that it is getting him some pussy.

Likewise, the mother is now completely comfortable with the children playing “guns”, clearly sending the message that fame and more specifically hip-hop fame excuses violence.

This hypocrisy so clearly mirrors that of the prison guards from earlier and sadly represents America’s reality. If everyone from the single Mothers in the ghetto to the police are down with rappers using guns it must be OK, right? And folks were even remotely shocked by Gambino’s music video which debuted nearly two years later?!

The episode closes when Van finally bails Earn out of jail. It is unsurprising really that it is left on the woman to pull through and protect the men. I find that this aspect of American reality is more often acknowledged in African American and other ethnic popular culture than in white. This is too bad really, as it is a remarkable reality which women are tremendously under-appreciated for. I too have bailed a boyfriend out of jail. I watched him walk out of the police station arms in the air, proud of his day.  He also never came with me to Salinas to collect the title of my car which I lost to the county in the bail process (its a complicated when you are only 21 and haven't owned anything or held a job for longer than 2 years).

Appropriately, the credits run to Bill Withers' "Grandma's Hands," subtly noting the importance of the matriarch through a beautiful song. This also solidifies Atlanta's role as one of the best television soundtracks I (the generally music ignoramous) have ever bothered to notice.

As the audience grows more comfortable with the odd (yet perfect) stylings of Atlanta we venture into episode three armed and ready to address poverty as it pertains to immaturity. In real life Donald Glover and I are the same age but somehow he plays Earn much younger. Pop Culture Happy Hour Pod Cast discussed this episode at length, pointing out that the pathetic date Earn organizes to impress Van is actually just a very young man's attempt at romance. They argue that this scene would likely play out quite differently for the couple ten years later. Then again, Glover himself might come back at this  this theory; pointing out the story he is trying to represent here is "the trap" and the assumption that the only thing which keeps Earn so completely suffocated by an up-selling, self-serving waiter is time is just a white, educated NPR audience being only marginally clear on the concept. I can see both sides to this particular coin while (as a white, educated NPR listener) also continuing to ascertain that Earn's overall behavior reminds me more of my 20 year old sister’s than my clique of 30-somethings (whom I consider millennials only due to some made-up falsehood of a technicality -- we are very clearly The Oregon Trail Generation).

Anyhow, this frozen-in-time youthfulness (as a means to escape poverty while actually perpetuating it) is already well established in our protagonist and immediately reinforced as the episode itself opens with him ordering a kid's meal at a fast food joint. No dice:

“I Didn’t get title of daytime manager by passing out discounts," the proud black girl behind the counter explains.

He begs for a water cup instead and settles on stealing diet coke from the fountain -- eyeing the hispanic janitor with a daring glance. He walks away in his short shorts in the rain and backpack, emphasizing either his pathetic-ness-- or just child-ness.

And as I so often did 14 years ago in the middle of the day he heads to Alfred's where they smoke blunts and play video games.

OK I didn’t play video games but my productivity level was essentially on par.

And somehow while reliving our own boring youths through this mundane existence of an ordinary day audiences are still terribly entertained.

Darius, our scene stealing, wonderful guru of a roommate irons in his bathrobe, pulling a gun out of a cereal box. "Just so you guy's know there's probably a bullet in here somewhere, “ he warns.

 A drug selling story arc evolves between Alfred and Darius which in a more mature moment Earn is wary of due in large part to his cousin’s new-found notoriety (but how else are they supposed to make money?)  however, because I am a white girl and the drug story in this episode just gets so fucking dark and also I can only bombard you with so much information I will instead focus in on the terrible date which Earn attempts in hopes to assuage Van's whining about his irresponsible behavior.

No dice

She's wary from the get. Even tries to refuse his invite at first but he begs:

“Can I at least buy you dinner and watch from the other side of the room? I can even get one of those corny ass dudes you like to eat it with you.”

He continues, mocking the guys she likes by mimicking her (always a good strategy when you’re trying to prove you are the preferred choice): “‘I love your energy. Your dreads are in a bun’ “

The two accuse each other of being their own worst black stereotypes.

“I’m in a bed but I’m technically homeless and love it,” she mocks back.

They giggle. Something about their terribly unromantic connection is just so terribly romantic. Or maybe I just really, really like when guys make fun of me?

There's a brief scene involving the gun between Darius and Alfred where Darius solidifies himself as my favorite character, absolutely proving unequivocally that the most simple men are also the wisest. He explains to Alfred that his “assumed perversion of the word daddy stems from his own fear of mortality.” sheer and idiotic genius. An utterly true and hilarious savant.

Meanwhile, the date Earn has finagled is not going according to plan. WIth only $63 in his bank account and promises of a decent happy-hour dashed he is just in a hipster restaurant in a bad neighborhood, springing for a valet, with a date who is luxuriously lapping us each and every ploy from their server to raise their check.

When Earn, trying to lower their overall bill in spite of Van's pricey picks asks for a "Miller High Life in a can," the waitress responds,"ooo we've got a hipster!"

Yes, us educated, white NPR listeners sure as fuck did try to appropriate poverty through the hipster movement, didn’t we?

You can get a $17 trotter hot dog at the bar around the way from my house.

Likewise, Darius and Alfred's drug deal has also gone all wrong. They have been led to the middle of nowhere only to find a gang of black men with chains, drinking Hennessy and hanging out in front of a luxury camper van chilling around a campfire. Here the woods are a stark juxtaposition from their familiar life in the projects and yet the forrest is surprisingly more menacing. Nothing safe about unfamiliarity -- particularly when guns are in the mix. However, even with a tied up guy crying in the corner there is this unshakable element of satire, ever present yet so difficult to explain or maybe even understand. An impending doom of hilarity is the omnipresent mark of all Atlanta scenes.

But just as the episode grows darker and all of our protagonists’ immaturity increasingly complicates their situations the resourcefulness these young men have learned growing up without means also manages to save them.

At the end of the day nobody wins -- and the best laugh is when the homeless guy working as the restaurant’s (off market) valet runs into the fancy restaurant to warn a random white man in an expensive suit that his car is being towed prompting the two polar-opposite gentlemen to race outside in excited collusion.  This sudden impromptu camaraderie is just a downright hilarious aside.

But in a true test to it’s sitcom roots, Atlanta holds to the rule that come episode four nothing much is really permissible to change so in spite of tremendous havoc nobody really loses. At the end of the day Earn solves the problem of the expensive date by reporting his debit card stolen and Darius and Alfred don't die.

Maybe even the homeless valet got a tip.

In both a sitcom’s writers room and in the trap, everybody's just trying to survive.

The following episode The Streisand Effect continues this exploration of survival. We peer through the lens into  fame and notoriety wondering if success built through any means necessary, driven by the sheer desire to survive can ever really be deemed ethical.

Oddly, the querry reminds me of one tackled by a completely socially unconscious show — the Friend’s episode where Phoebe and Joey argue the existence of  truly selfless good deeds in The one where Phoebe hates PBS.

The Streisand Effect centers a similar debate through a racially ambiguous asshole internet "celebrity" (aka troll) who causes an all out twitter feud (which Alfred brings to real life).  Meanwhile  an interesting story line between Darius and Earn play out as the two explore what one’s existence means when you are truly just surviving pay check to pay check.

There are other episodes I love more and will focus more energy into analyzing but here are a few of the very best, most stand-out lines:

Old bartender: "Guy was Smoking a swisher with no weed. He gave me the creeps."

Darius: "Chinese people short because of Genghis Kahn, look it up!"              Earn: "In what? The racism book?"

The aforementioned troll (Zan) to Alfred (who is accusing his internet game of being pretty fucked up): "All a gang, we all just hustling"

Alfred: "I have to rap, I'm making the most of a bad situation."                          Zan: "You’re exploiting your situation. All of us are exploiting to make money"(hilarious scene ensues with Zan filming a paid child to spout filthy rhymes and deliver pizzas).

And if you are interested, this moment is discussed in greater depth on Fresh Air where, Brian Tyree Henry explains what this trap means to him.

We close with Earn teaching Darius that poor people don't have time for investments they need to eat today. This is a poignant moment where their friendship is solidified, poverty is explored and human nature vs. exploitation is left undecided.

Personally, I tend to agree with both Alfred and Zan’s views of exploitation though admittedly Alfred’s actions are certainly carried with far more integrity.

If you are particularly dense but have made it all the way to episode five, Nobody Beats the Biebs, you will no longer be able to ignore the absurdist tactics this show is employing to fuck with our perceptions of race, appropriation, stereotypes and popular music culture. 

The episode takes place mainly within a high school gym at a celebrity basketball fundraiser for Atlanta’s Youth. Paperboi has been invited to participate in the charity game and Earn of course attends as “representation”. Noticing a gorgeous successful news anchor there to cover the event, Alfred ditches Earn and sets off to pursue a date (or at the very least an on-air interview). She immediately staves off both advances, letting him know that she knows him as “the guy who shot someone.” He insists that isn't really who he is and invites her to get to know the real him, "I'll let you interview me someplace real fly like Bennihana," he offers to which she retorts that she and her fan base aren't into the “gangster thing”, and blows him off fairly easily as the commotion of "Justin Bieber's" arrival has distracted the masses.

At first I assumed that Justin Bieber was one of the white guys in this entourage but as a feud ensues between Alfred and JB you realize that in the fantastical world Glover has created Bieber is in fact just black. Or at least appears that way to us. After watching the whole episode I can't definitively pinpoint why Glover created this racial fluidity. Was it a point about racial appropriation, common perceptions and stereotypes? Or was he just trying to fuck with his audiences? I can only assume that most of Glover’s surrealist style is designed to achieve all of the above (and more). Anyway, this Bieber who may be just as black in appearance as Paperboi, is definitely not just one in the same. Other than his outward appearance the Bieber Fever is the same douchey, successful, unapologetic and handsome man I assume him to be in real life (admittedly I know zero about Justin). In Glover’s world though he can pee on the floor in front of everyone and the general opinion of him is not even slightly affected. He is the Golden Boy pervious to social optics and to him (much like to the pretty newsgirl) Paperboi is "a nigga who blew  other niggas brains out…” although he adds the operative “cool!" to the end of this statement. As the episode develops Alfred's hatred towards this pop sensation grows and they wage war on the court. Afterward Bieber offers  a press conference full of "sincere" apologies for the fight. All really just a marketing ploy for his new song called "Justice," (a title with more irony than I care to unpack here).

Meanwhile, Earn and Darius are also confronted by stereotypes and racial profiling. 

Earn encounters a successful music agent who mistakes him for a different black man whom she believes destroyed her career. In an attempt to seek revenge on this man she at first is very kind. She invites Earn into an elite circle of producers it is all very posh and excellent for networking and Earn laps it up, happy to play along with her confusion as long as this woman’s racism serves his needs. The rewards are seemingly high enough that Earn can turn a blind eye, joining a very specific brand of self loathing by embracing  the fact that he is participating in one of the most frustrating and oldest stereotypes out there: "all you people look the same.” It isn't until she accuses him of undercutting her and pledges to ruin him that he tells her he is not in fact Alonzo to which she retorts. "I'm going to make sure you die homeless." He certainly seems to be on this path.

Darius' day is equally bizarre and yet also totally conceivable. His storyline is so unique I can't help but marvel over where the inspiration came from. It seems safe to assume it must be rooted in someone’s real life experience. Perhaps a news story that was mostly overlooked? I digress, he paints a dog (which it seems worth noting that in addition to being quite the homemaker Darius is  a talented artist and his room is full of these supplies). Darius rolls up his painting and goes to the shooting range where he uses his art for target practice. Harmless enough, right? Not quite, a collective panic ensues. A white man calls Darius “psycho for shooting a dog” and tells him he has to leave, to which Darius explains that “a human target is just as specific as shooting a dog.” Which just seems pretty accurate to me. A Mexican guy joins in the bickering, he points out to the white guy that he shoots at Mexican targets. Stating more truth spurs further anger and an uprising is vowed. Darius tries to explain that dogs in his ‘hood are “fucked up (not cuddly pets)” but the range’s manager interrupts the men’s arguing with a shot gun,

“I told you rules before you got here ain’t gunna let you start no shit” he leads out a very patient Darius.

This scene is so fucked up.  Its rhetoric on arbitrary rules and categories is so important while remaining on brand with the show’s satirical edge. It magnifies the fact that the laws of a black man with a gun are so, so different than that of a white man with a gun takes a very different and slightly less sinister spin on the all too familiar police shooting unarmed black men storyline. We also get a close look at how Darius is observed and judged. A recurring theme of Atlanta is the simultaneous invisibility and hyper-visibility of the impoverished and minorities.

The episode ends with Black Bieber's aforementioned ”sincere" apology, explaining he's been trying to be too cool lately which has lead to hanging with the wrong crowd. He offers his new-found commitment to christ and uses autotune to premier his new song, Justice. In the back of the crowd, frustrated and over it Alfred returns to his day’s start and gives picking up the anchor another go. She returns with the lesson we’ve witnessed all of our protagonists scrambling to learn for the past 30 minutes” “let me give you some advice, play your part. People don’t want Justin to be asshole they want you to be asshole. You’re the rapper. That’s your job”

So, in sum this episode features….

Black man kicked out of shooting range

Black man mistaken for other black man

Black rapper unable to escape media’s perceptions of murderer in spite of being recognized as an “Atlanta Celebrity”.

All the while a rich white musician is able to chameleon himself into an infallible black superstar for a bit of extra street cred.

There is a lot to dissect here, but I’ll let an ethnic studies course can take it from here...

Episode 6, aptly titled Value is the first one to really feature Van's story and give women a voice. I was immediately interested to see if a woman took the reigns in the writer's room on this one because even the tone is so different.It didn’t take much digging to find this from Joshua Alston over at the A.V. Club. 

“Glover started off strong before a single frame was shot by bringing in staff writer Stefani Robinson to assist on the script, the first to give a writing credit to someone whose last name isn’t Glover. It seems like a little thing, but it makes such a huge difference to know that someone with insights about how black women communicate contributed to an episode that mostly consists of black women communicating and miscommunicating.”

It feels easy to  proclaim that the tone employed in Value lacks the humorist sensibilities applied to other episodes but I have to wonder if that’s an oversimplification. Perhaps I just found Van's story so horribly relatable (she seems to have the same dumb (re:bad) luck as myself and the series of unfortunate events which befall her here may just feel less satirical when you’ve felt the hardships yourself? Maybe a black man from the trap in Atlanta wouldn't find other episodes this season as funny as I did? Maybe I'm being sensitive? (Though that doesn't really sound like me to be honest). Or, maybe while very, very good this episode just wasn't meant to punch the gut in the same manner a jokey man-centric 30 minutes does. Maybe Glover isn’t ready to tackle female satire. I'm not sure and it seems like all these assumptions could get me in trouble so in the interest of not putting my foot in my mouth (or pulling a Van) I’ll move on....

This episode centers around the drama which ensues when Van's old friend comes into town. Actually, in this case (as is often true with childhood girlfriends) frenemy is a better term. This gal-pal plays companion to NBA players which subsequently allows her to lead a very posh lifestyle. She is baffled by Van's far more humble life and makes her judgements very clear by stating straight off the bat the following three rather insensitive points:

“Sometimes I wish I had a kid and then I'm like ew, no." (preach sista!)

“Back in the day you would have made fun of yourself for still fucking with Earn.”

and 

“Black women have to be valuable. NBA players fuck with me because I provide a service. I am worth it. I am cultured, intelligent...."

the implications here are thick and seem to cut very deep.

Anyway, as a passive aggressive fight inevitably ensues Van's girl does eventually bribe her back into frenemy territory, insisting they make up over a joint. They hotbox the bitch’s fancy-ass car and at first seem to be reliving the good old days but as is apt to happen when you hang out with narcissists (particularly in our social media obsessed times) eventually Van finds herself being forced into snapping pic after pic of her social-climbing friend who is dead set on getting that absolute perfect insta-shot. I have zero patience for this behavior. Actually, every girl who has ever made the mistake of forcing me into this game has quickly fallen out of my good graces.

Ultimately, the mess that ensues for Van because she casually decided to hit a joint a few times with her disaster of an old friend is totally comparable to multiple series of my own disasters. Fortunately for both myself and Van (we’re similarly industrious and independent young women) we do manage to pick ourselves up by our bootstraps and move on. But, for a minute suspend your disbelief that I too could create this sort of disaster and let's discuss Van's mess:

She awakens the next morning to a cell phone reminder that today is “drug test day.” This of course prompts an insane rampage as she attempts to figure out where to get “clean urine.” When both Old Friend and Alfred fail her she realizes she has a whole garbage pail full of her baby's diapers. A true renaissance woman Van creates a complicated process to extract the pee and tapes a condom full of her daughter's urine to her own thigh. In a flowy dress she heads off to school (making it clear for the first time that she is an educator of some sort).

The storyline then takes a quick veer from the very normal baby-pee-condom situation prompted by a basketball “prostitute” to a  fellow teacher who approaches Van. This woman is beyond frustrated with one of her student’s. A  brief aside ensues regarding a black child who has come to school in white face to fuck with his teacher (who is so mad she begs Van to help her deal with him so she "doesn't get arrested for beating his ass,”). It is a sharp return to the previous episode’s discussion of cultural appropriation, reminding viewers how inescapable race wars are for Glover.

Van declines to help her friend, she is on a mission after all. But of course, things don’t quite go as planned. A bit of physical comic relief ensues when she can't untie the condom of pee. She tries to rip things apart with her teeth which of course results in pee spraying everywhere (except of course in the cup for urine sample).

Desperate Van just admits to the principal that she smoked weed.

This is definitely something I would do.

When you’re honest no-one can fault you, right?!

Wrong.

Dissapointed, the principal explains that the county can’t afford quarterly drug tests anyway so after the initial one required for hire the samples aren’t actually sent anywhere.

Of course.

She levels with Van, “everyone smokes weed. The system isn’t made for these kids to succeed and you gotta shake it off somehow. I get it. But unfortunately you’ve admitted your drug use to a government employee and now I have to fire you. To cover my own ass as well as the schools’”

She gives Van a hug and one weeks notice.

Defeated Van, an inexperienced druggie tries to get more weed from Alfred who tells her she's “sloppy as fuck.” Which after the day she has had is just truth.

The episode closes with the same kid still in white face smirking now in Van’s class.

Again, somehow the female battle of race and class explored in this episode feels more sad to me than the male saga we’ve seen play out thus far

The closing shot of the sinister child in white face and my own history is undoubtedly playing into my interpretation. I will admit here that I have two equally stupid stories of being fired for absolutely absurd things that make zero sense. Once for rolling a blunt by request for my boss. A swisher of marijuiana which I didn't smoke and only procured because he asked.  Another time a 28 year old woman claimed I was sexually harassing her. In neither case was I truly guilty and yet somehow believed that an overcompensated apology could fix things with the higher-ups. At the end of the day though everyone is just interested in covering their own asses. Again, this probably could be presented far more satirically and at times I am able to give these stories a bitingly funny spin — but not with the regularity one might assume.I suppose what I’m getting at is I know what it's like to essentially be so inexperienced with getting in trouble that you can't tell when to just shut your goddamn mouth. I also think that this assumed guilt is such a female burden. It is a subsequent and frequently overlooked side effect of the ancient historical annals of sexism. Perhaps if we can learn anything from “mansplaining” it is to always just take the position that everyone else just doesn’t get it. But then also just keep our mouths shut.

Episode 7, B.A.N has got to be the most hilarious, perfect, wonderful episode of Glover's premier season (and pretty much of all television of all time). I feel fairly confident saying its everyone's favorite. B.A.N which stands for Black American Network is (simply put) a fictional television episode called Montague; a black spin on a Donahue-esque late night “news” show featuring Alfred as one of it’s guests. The "fake news" premise on this show delves into the complexities of identity in our touchy PC culture and is in its own right more than enough to ensure side gripping hilarity. However, it is the commercials interspersed throughout this episode that really cinch the deal.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The subject of the Montague episode, “how accepted sexuality is affecting black American Youth and Culture” features a panel made up exclusively of Paperboi and the head of “Trans Issues.”  Ummmm..... really? I’m already laughing

Alfred is being called out by Montague and asked to explain a comment he made on twitter, quoted by our host as such: “y’all N words said I was weird for not wanting to F word Kaitlyn Jenner."

He is asked if this makes him transphobic? Alfred is complacent, admitting that while he gets what they're saying she (Jenner) just isn't "important to me".

The white trans expert explains Paperboi is coming from a culture of exclusion and power; the black community has issues with power and masculinity more than transphobia. She calls him out on the layer of fluidity in his raps to which he uses the same line he used in response to the challenges posed earlier by the racially ambiguous internet celebrity, Van: "I'm just trying to get paid." The ultimate premise of this show is, after all, escaping the trap life.

Cut to commercial break.

And here is the gold:

Commercial 1: Black guy in a bodega being up-charged for a can of Arizona Iced Tea. The tagline: Arizona: price is on the can.

Commercial 2: A masquerade party filled with fancy black people drinking Mickey's forty ounce bottles out of champagne flutes. Tagline? Mickey’s: You're drinking it wrong.

Yes! This appeals to all my senses. I remember when I was 19 and 40 ounces, Conan O’brien, Swisher Sweets, 7-11 sandwiches and a bit of homework were evening staples.

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming:

A Montague correspondent is reporting on scene regarding a “trans-racial” black teenager (I kid you not) who self-identifies as, yes, a 35 year old white man. Ummm..... I hope you’re laughing now too.

As a black teenage boy he had always wondered why he wasn't getting the respect he deserved, "then it hit me,” he tells the reporter, “I'm 35 and I'm white."

Obviously.

We cut to scenes of our trans-racial teenage adult pretending the projects are the suburbs of Colorado.

He explains his Mom just  doesn't get it. Cut to her explaining, "I'd love to wake up and say I'm Rhianna but I 'aint"

Which as a white woman I’m going on brand with the appropriation I mentioned earlier and I just have to say: “preach sista!” If I get to come back as anyone in my next life I sure as fuck hope its Rhianna. Sometimes I ask myself what would Rhi Rhi do? and then I remember to just do me.

But I digress, our teen’s response to his mother’s dismissal is to explain that they don't "realize race is just a made up thing" and he doesn't believe in labels. Unwilling to accept this “reality” he is presently working on getting (yes) racial transition surgery while also stopping trying to convince others he's not "us". Ummm....

Rather than argue he tries to show his community he is not one of them by doing incredibly stand-up white male things like turning black guys into the cops.

This episode came out years before the recent onslaught of social media documenting black people having cops called on them  for doing very questionable things like sleeping in their own dorms but I still challenge you not to be laughing hysterically by this point.

As great as this storyline is though, who can complain when it's time to return to commercials?

First up a commercial break for Swisher Sweets (looks like I too was a trans-racial teenager). In the commercial all the actors are emptying the guts of their swishers to enjoy in between filming sets. Duh.

Quickly though, I want to admit that I am not doing this insanely perfect 30 minutes of remarkability justice —please watch! In the meantime though I return to Montague’s panel….

Paperboi admits to the audience he is afraid of being persecuted by the audience and does not feel comfortable speaking his mind. Our female white expert accuses him of being unable to have intelligent dialogue without spewing profanity (proving his point, of course). Montague continues by asking Al if he hates trans people because of his lack of a father.

If your head is spinning and you’re feeling ready to throw down you aren’t alone but Alfred handles the insanity with unbelievable levels of eloquence. He explains, ”It is hard for me to care about this because no one cares about me as a black man. Kaitlyn Jenner is just doing what white men have done since the dawn of time which is whatever the hell they want. Why should I care?"

He goes on to question where the tolerance is for him?

And yes, this is the crux of it.

It is far easier to speak out against intolerance when you are privileged.

The white expert agrees with his point but as is talk show nature Montague  keeps egging for the drama.

All getting a little too real? No worries, we have a commercial to lighten the emotions.

Or is it just more sad truth?

First up we have a commercial reminiscent of the 1-800-psychic infomercials of my youth. A perfect example of selling an ideal to the impoverished rather than a reality, and media assumingThe poor are an easy target as they are so desperate for a solution out of poverty they can easily be taken advantage of. Sadly, gullible.

Or maybe it is me that’s sad and I just don't believe in magic-- perhaps my cynicism is the problem?

A man (I believe the same guy from the bus in episode one) is offering us “the answers we deserve.” He goes on to talk about chakras and crystals and the power to make his customers rich.

"Call now and you get a free juice and Nutella sandwich" he proclaims.

And now I'm even more in love with this episode.

Cut to a Dodge Charger commercial concerning divorce settlements which is too complex to describe but also totally accurate and finally the episode’s piece de resistance -- a fully animated Coco Cruncherz commercial with a “black Trix bunny" being beaten up by a cop because he is trying to steal the kid's sugary morning treat (which is of course just for kids). As the kids plead with the cop to stop he argues that age old tag line Coco Cruncherz is for kids -- harking again back to my youth and Saturday morning cartoon days when the innocent commercials with a rabbit stealing breakfast was not nearly as menacing (or realistic).

And just like that with a seemingly sweet cartoon we have jumped the line from dangerously sinister satire to downright sadness. Nobody wants to see a cartoon cop beat the shit out of  a black cartoon  bunny especially in front of a bunch of cartoon kids.

And yet its still so funny and important.

Close commercials and we circle back to our black teen dressed like a white man. Alfred can't stop laughing at him "You look like Fellon Degeneres!"

But don’t feel sorry for this misunderstood teen to soon. When the trans expert welcomes him, the kid uses his new platform to spew his own stereotypes, explaining that marriage is meant for a man and woman and men can't turn into women. So while he believes in racial fluidity he is totally close-minded to gender fluidity.

Obviously.

This episode and how it speaks to acceptance of other cultures is fantastic but the commercials and the garbage peddled to lower classes and minorities specifically is crucial. If I was an American Studies High School teacher I think I could develop an entire semester’s worth of curriculum on these 20 minutes.

Episode eight, The Club features our motley crew at a club and clearly miserable about it. As a woman whose personal anthem is George Thorogood and the Destroyers I Drink Alone I couldn't possibly find this more relatable. The only reason why Alfred, Earn and Darius are even at the club in the first place is because Paperboi is being paid for the appearance.

Since I’ve already managed to drone on for close to 10,000 words and supplied an overwhelming amount of both series and personal anecdotes, for this episode briefing I’ll do my best to just take a moment or two for a quick review of a few standout moments and trust that you, dear reader, now have obtained a certain level of Sylvie’s Mind Mastery to elaborate on the now all too predictable consensus:  this episode is just as fabulously funny, sad, complicated and littered with omnipresent issues of social status as the next.

And now in side-splitting surrealist summation:

Earn on the dance floor with subtitles for his thoughts: "somebody smells like Wendy's Double Stack.

Darius showing the crew instagrams of a famous guy in the ‘hood who has a very fancy invisible car. Noteworthy: I thought Darius was just gullible at first but I clearly underestimated Glover’s dedication to metaphor. If you’re still confused by media’s dark comedy, magical realism, social commentaries on race (a new and now thanks in large part to Glover a very dominant genre) don't worry so am I.

Earn gets drunk enough to feel powerful and demand the money owed from the owner for Alfred's appearance and subsequently vomits all over him (sounds about right).

Darius has trouble getting through security after he steps out momentarily to blaze. Rather than put up too much of a fight he goes home to eat cereal and play video games (I'm pretty sure we will get married in season 3). 

Alfred and Earn go to beat up the club owner for trying to rip them off (by now vomit free). After the boys finally obtain what they are rightfully owed they leave the club, at last drunk enough to be  in a decent mood. While laughing and talking about getting food  they are startled by gun fire. People start to run but most of the crowd is maimed anyway as a man seated seemingly on nothing floats by (in an invisible car, clearly) and mows down the crowd.

This is so complex -- Donald Glover has completely lost me and yet I am obsessively curious. What does this mean? What does it say about our culture? Did he just think it was funny? Does the invisibility represent the utter bullshit of an expensive car? It must somehow tie back to status and violence but what is he saying exactly? I’m wary to even venture a guess.

Either way, The boys escape to Waffle House for a post mortem with Darius. The men are still drunk and laughing, moods still surprisingly upbeat though if you know anything about Southern Culture the very fact that this restaurant is still serving speaks volumes of the gravity (or lack thereof) of the violent incident. Things shift toward somber though as the local news streams through in the back ground. A story reporting the incident clearly lays suspected blame  on Paperboi. 

"Fuck the club," says Alfred.

Indeed.

Last year Juneteenth was finally brought into the average modern white person's rhetoric through a "holiday special" for the masses from the very funny (and carefully cultivated to expand mainstream America's mind) Blackish.

Atlanta's take on the holiday is of course slightly more subversive. Certainly due to its non-network and later time slot it is more carefree and able to cater less  to the masses. Nonetheless, I am certain that Atlanta’s episode managed to bring a bit of awareness even if the show -- unlike Blackish -- made zero attempts to educate the ignorant on what Juneteenth is exactly.  It doesn’t matter though, because well... Wikipedia... Glover is smart to assume that his audience is woke enough to use their pricey smartphones to look up whatever they don't already know. Maybe I should learn to employ a similar tactic.

Anyway, on Juneteenth Earn leisurely wakes and bakes in some random girls' bed. When his alarm goes off he is rushed into reality, panics and dashes out. Cut to him and Van in the car where she is very unimpressed that he is stoned which plays out in a passive aggressive fight over the automatic windows in her car. Although we don't know where they are going or why, it is made quite clear that this is an important outing for Van, and that Earn is complicity playing along basically because they have a child together.

They arrive at a fancy house, with a fancy valet and a fancy black woman named Monique answers the door. "happy Juneteenth," she proclaims and then proceeds to humble brag her home "we have so many bathrooms!”

Her white husband Craig makes a grand entrance also proclaiming "happy freedom day."

This is already a very strange party.

Earn retreats for drinks which he orders from a very condescending bartender in an African print bow tie.

"Emancipation Eggnog?" asks Earn "It's June!"

To which the Bartender replies "nigga do I have to explain alliteration to you?!"

Earn takes his beverage and wanders through the looming home finding the white husband, Craig’s office does nothing to alleviate the strangeness. The room is full of black art which Craig painted based on one of his favorite Malcolm X quotes. He explains to Earn that black musical artists are a product for white American consumption and appropriation. He pours them some Hennessy and is baffled that Earn hasn't been to Africa and also does not know where exactly he is from.

Just a side note all this has inspired my own bit of spinoff commercial satire: We all know by now that gene testing companies can provide a great deal of knowledge for White Europeans but usually lack the same insight into an African person’s roots and thusly all their televised advertising features a white person drinking whiskey in the Irish pub of their forefathers or celebrating an ancestors Viking victory. I think it’s high time someone (Preferably Glover and not me because I’m clearly far busier) wrote a commercial with a black person talking about the slave ship he learned his great great grandmother was shackle on etc etc.

Anyhow, Craig employs a specific style of appropriation (seemingly bred from his own white insecurity and guilt rather than ignorance or hate) to black shame the unassuming young man he has invited to drink in his home.

Earn retreats, whispering to Van that the party feels "very eyes wide shut." (Which I myself hadn't yet noticed but once brought to the periphery realize  could not be more accurate). Frustrated that Earn hasn't embraced her thing she asks him to “just once pretend that they aren't who they are so he doesn't blow this opportunity” for her.

He responds by bringing on what I’d like to classify as his very best "douche" (I know , I know, this is not the PC term) in order to impress the "very cultural" uptight, wealthy black people this party is full of.

Van seems to be binge drinking which, as is apt to happen eventually leads to a retreat for a bit of an overwhelmed bathroom cry.

Afterward she winds up outside with Monique who finally starts to reveal actual elements of her own humanity. "You don't think I know how crazy my husband is? Treating black people like a hobby?" And there it is — the thing I have been grappling with as I’ve attempted to blog this season of Atlanta over the course of a three-plus month period. At the end of the day it is safe to assume that the best I can really do is just repeat their story and really I have no shot at successful analyzation. Craig’s overwhelming analyzation is enough.

Van asks Monique if she wishes she had someone to confide in to which Monique responds with this equally telling quote. "It is redundant to be both black and sorry in the world."

With nowhere else to go they return to the party to find Craig performing a poetry slam on Jim Crow in front of his black guests’ and this is when shit hits the fan....

The party’s crew of valets find Earn and attempt to give him their sister's underwear to pass on to Paperboi (I can't even begin to understand why a brother would agree to this for his sister and I refuse to believe my ignorance is cultural). The gesture may be gross but it is relevant to this story's evolution because they have outed Earn as Paperboi’s “manager.” Monique's husband increases the awkwardness by bringing up the shooting. Oddly if memory serves this is the first time since episode two that the series opening incident has been directly referenced. Or maybe it isn't weird at all, maybe the whole point of this surreal show is nothing can be taken seriously enough to carry over to the next episode. Isn’t that the rule of thumb for sitcoms anyhow? Needless to say for the time being the fact that Earn is somebody and not the nobody Monique had assumed seems to make her quite uncomfortable to which Earn responds with spite. Fed up by a full day of clear hypocrisy he proclaims the very real observation that “this is all wack, its not real life and they are all dumb.”

Van rather emotionless attempts to drag her partner away, making it clear she knew  this all along.

“Stop stunning on me about culture,” Earn shouts. “I’m not going to go back to Africa to discover my roots cuz I’m fucking broke. Stop being so black-able!”

We cut to Earn driving home. He promises Van (with eyes closed next to him)  to call Monique in the morning to apologize.

Van opens her eyes demands he pull over and when he does she climbs on top of her man and starts banging him right there in the drivers' seat. In spite of it all they are young, have a baby and I think most importantly she is more attracted to his authenticity than the party's grandeur and faux behavior. The screen zooms out on the lovers in the middle of nowhere with the haunting lyrics of Chain Gang from Sam Cook and nothing seems so well earned and genuine than the freedom these two young black humans have to express their complicated love outdoors in Atlanta in June. Or maybe I'm just being romantic. So far as I know no one is actually  allowed to have sex in their cars outside of their own garage.

The season finale like many episodes starts with Earn waking up in someone else’s home. While this is a recurring start I somehow missed the trend until now. Perhaps that is attributable to the fact that our finale stresses the relevance of Earn’s homelessness. In this scene he is uncomfortably situated in a bean bag chair and being chastised for fucking up whomever's house he has crashed at.

“Where's my jacket?" Earn manages to ask a few times but the homeowner is too distracted with the destruction Earn has caused. So Earn leaves and calls Alfred who also has no idea where the jacket is. This is clearly a bummer for Earn but great news on my end. The missing clothing means we have some 20 odd minutes  ahead to enjoy Earn retracing the steps of a wasted night. This is a plot premise I have adored ever since Ashton Kutcher spoke to my very sensible 17-year-old- stoner- humor in Dude Where's My Car. I haven't watched the film in years and I know it gets a bad rap but I'd be hard pressed to believe that it doesn't stand the test of time. Since this is Atlanta though the surrealism is even more omnipresent than similar story arcs. 

As Earn travels through his home-town (True to its name Atlanta has remained one of the most crucial characters throughout the season) he notices that everyone is dressed as cows. He asks a stranger why the costumes "Free chicken sandwich day nigga,” he’s told

Duh.

So Earn gets his sandwich and in true Dude form heads to the strip club to see if his jacket might be there. Maybe Glover was also a fan of this fine film— we are the same age after all.

A wonderfully awkward and funny scene ensues where Earn tries to describe one stripper who might have his jacket to another stripper.

Largely unsuccessful (how does one describe one generic stripper to another?) the girl is more preoccupied anyhow, her focus being on getting herself cast in a Paperboi video.

Defeated, he defers to last night’s snapchat stories to recall where he went next. Had this technology existed 15 years ago maybe the Dudes also could have found their cars in 27 minutes.

Frustrated by his snaps, Earn instead goes to chastise Alfred for his inappropriate "stories" but Al explains social media is important work. "Rappers make money on appearances" to which Earn reaffirms it is a bad idea.

Darius chimes in "That's black people's number one problem, they don't know how to have fun."

"I don't think that's our number one problem," Earn says to which I laugh out loud. 

And then I laugh again just reading my notes on this episode. And then again during editing. I am proud of Earn for this comment. For the most part he tends to be slower than his buddies when it comes to off the cuff quips.

In a stalemate, Earn defers to ridesharing apps. And even though I'm pretty sure Uber does not actually work this way Alfred is able to call last night's car to try to locate Earn's jacket. Yes, this affirms it, late 90's technology or the lack there of is the only thing that made Dude realistic (to which of course I  understand it still wasn't at all but... y'know....).

Alfred agrees to pay the 50 dollars the Uber driver demands for the chore but is annoyed that he is back to bailing out his cousin. They sit in the car stoned and discuss Jamaican food in a relatable way that will make any stoner smile.

Then something big finally happens for Alfred. Something that could carry over to season 2 or slide into another dream like fantasy never to be mentioned again (both viable options given the strikingly realistic and terribly fantastical world Atlanta has created). Earn gets a call from a famous rapper, Senator K, requesting Paperboi open for his upcoming tour

But before they can get too excited Alfred says "something here is off" and tries to bail. Just then an undercover van pulls the group over.

The group of black men are then patted down for seemingly no reason and asked if they are tring to purchase illegal things from the driver.

Just a jacket they claim.

A small chase scene ensues and the Uber driver is shot down.

And now there is a dead man wearing Earn's jacket.

Earn looks devastated he tells the cops he left something “in there. Can they check the pockets?”

No dice.

So Alfred tries to cheer him up, gives him a roll of cash -- his 5% on the tour deal, affirms that Earn finally “did good.”

But Earn just awkwardly walks away, defaulting to his defeated little kid look in his short shorts and his backpack. He Stops briefly to dump a rock out of his shoe and then goes to Van's and cooks a family dinner. It is a brief sweet moment, interrupted by a friend stopping by to drop off Earn's key. "I've been looking for this all day." he tells him. The proverbial “car” has been retrieved.

Finally at ease Earn and Van retreat to the couch where he gives her the roll of cash. He really does want to support her. There is another sweet moment as the two lie on the couch laughing at how bad of a drug dealer he would be and she asks him to stay but again like a kid he and his back pack leave.

There is something sweet and promising here. A rarity in this funny but often self-defeating show.

Rather than use his friends and family Earn steps out— finally on his own for the night.

He goes to a storage unit and opens it with the key he spent the day looking for. We finally see that Earn is not entirely without a home. This lonely unit with a couch is what he has and clearly why he is consistently waking in other people's spaces. He takes off his shoe, and we realize he wasn't dumping a rock at all but using his sneaker as a bank. No matter, weather shaking out a pebble or stocking cash taking his shoe off in the street earlier must have been Earn’s first sense of relief this season.

[iluvtv]

This is America

A month or so ago I began the questionable task of blogging about the first season of Atlanta in its entirety. Fully aware that I’d be navigating the tricky waters of systemic racism in Trump’s America coupled with Glover’s compelling and often utterly, mind-blowingly, confusing surrealism I was almost certain that my 90′s era Berkeley High Ethnic Studies course coupled with a few courses from Angela Davis at UCSC had hardly prepared my progressive Bay Area white privileged mind to deconstruct the genius that is Atlanta. And so, I have gone down a rabbit-hole of my own making and after endless weeks of research and writing I have a mess of thousands of words hardly ready for sharing now (if ever).  Not one to give up easily I refuse to throw in the towel just yet but I did figured it was time to crawl out of my cave and address a lighter more timely topic, Roseanne  --

Oh shit, I’m back on systemic racism in Trump’s America.

And while I really think the Ol Girl's already gotten more attention than she’s worth today I am very glad that as a country we aren’t willing to tolerate racist tweets from anyone other than our POTUS (didn’t I tell you TV was EVERRRRYYYTHHINNNGGGG?!).

Anyway more to the point, in the whole mess of news coverage a little question that has been nagging at me for months  was finally brought to the surface (I even started to speak on this in my Atlanta blog but got distracted by commercials where Mickey’s is drunk in champagne flutes and the like) whis is why the fuck has Kenya Barris not left ABC?!!

Back in February after reading a news clip from the NYT that a Black-ish episode was being pulled due to “creative differences” I wrote this note in my list of things to do:

ABC Pulls ‘black-ish’ Episode Over ‘Creative Differences’

https://nyti.ms/2tDPWVw I bet he goes to different service

And I had genuinely meant to research it more and of course write a predictive blog but as we all know I was elbow-deep in maple syrup (my breakfast blog) and just never made the time. Then the Upfronts came around and with it news of a slew of shows jumping networks but nary a peep on Black-ish or Barris leaving and so I shrugged it off as a contractual obligation and instead just barraged my poor clients with personal insight between back squats and pull ups.

And then yesterday (the night after I finally got around to watching the terribly disappointing premier episode of the Roseanne reboot) I got the news alert on my phone that ABC was pulling the plug. Too juicy a story not to click on I took the bait and buried in the bottom graft I got what I’d been looking for all along:  

I began poking around on the interwebs and while, yes while I may not always be able to analyze all that is corrupt about America I sure as fuck have a sort of 6th sense when it comes to a writer’s room.  Turns out if I’d bothered to look around rather than just writing a note to myself The Hollywood Reporter actually broke MY story months ago but I’ll just go ahead and give myself a pat on the back -- affirmed that I am some sort of self-educated savant in the medium that is television. 

Anyway I guess I just popped back here to brag a bit. Reinvigorated that my endless reading/viewing isn’t for naught maybe I’ll even be able to polish off my review of Atlanta’s Season One before he drops something else earth shattering we’re all rightfully distracted by.

And for one more factoid regarding Roseanne -- Ambien had this to say:

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The Encyclopedia of Breakfast

The not so secret, secret is I truly manage to watch (and notate) far more television than there actually is time to write about.

I’d like to attribute this to reserving my writing to TV’s truest gems but the fact of the matter is that even when you wake up before dawn there still are just so many hours in a day. 

So, about three weeks ago I sat down to offer a quick round-up of a few of my sillier (mainstream) viewing habits. The sort of TV I loath to admit but am wary of being judged for tuning into. These formulaic network sitcoms are  inevitably littered with a funny line here, an occasional cutting edge concept there, or perhaps just a shockingly good writing staff. Maybe it isn’t groundbreaking television but I still took 20 pages of notes and thusly an hour to watch each 22 minute episode. I might as well share...

So, in the interest of time I began this piece with every intention of being light breezy and quick. But let’s all just take a moment to wake up,  smell the proverbial coffee (I’ll get to the grounds of that later) and accept that easy and brief is a style which eludes me. Instead just be grateful that I generally wake up before 4 am and don’t have children and in turn have endless hours to meditate on silliness. So, in that spirit let’s honor this sunrise and those sitcom Mommies that maybe have less time in their day because they actually are making family meals at dawn and remember that either way no matter who the fuck you are we all just put our pants on every morning one leg at a time.

But I’m getting ahead of myself here... Last night while tuning into The Mick I noticed something that I had somehow assumed was a stylistic choice exclusive to Modern Family 

(it isn’t afterall, and who is surprised – that show never really was as groundbreaking as we all wanted it to be though they are as of late doing a tremendous job satirizing Goop and all that is bullshit about Gwyneth Paltrow. These jabby jokes are good enough to warrant a blog all their own – but instead I’ll just wrap this one up with a few–).  

But I digress…. What I’m doing a very roundabout way of getting to here is that many sitcoms more often than not are introduced with breakfast. Now before you go rewatching every American Housewife episode you so obviously have DVR’d I am NOT saying these shows exclusively open with breakfast, however many employ the start frequently enough that I’ve started to wonder just when exactly the cereal is going to show up. I’ve come to realize though that if I don’t get a whiff of coffee right before the theme song and opening credits the waffles and eggs are usually trailing only a few scenes later.

Network sitcoms, though often fueled by clever wit from a sharp and talented writers room are generally just safe enough to avoid being ascribed as thought provoking and in kind have never quite warranted the energy or prompted my intelectual side quite enough to ponder why in matters as mundane such as breakfast. And so I will blame the very essence of formula itself for causing me to completely miss the fact that not only do nearly all family sitcoms open with breakfast but that this stylistic preference isn’t without a point. Now that it has come to my attention however I realize I’ve been blindly watching television families dine on donuts together since the 90′s and the whole thing suddenly seems just so incredibly obvious: how better to maximize time and jokes and theme than follow a family through their respective days? And where do family days begin? Why, with breakfast of course!

As I began to consider this concept I realized that this rule trends towards the more specific sub-genre of family-sitcom. I suppose the only reason I noticed this part at all is I am presently working my way through David Bianculi’s The Platinum Age of Television: from I Love Lucy to The Walking Dead how TV became terrific and of course am mostly drawn to his chapters on situational comedies. Bianculli explains the sitcom has “spread into so many varieties, classifying them all, as an evolutionary exercise, is like listing every species of an ant and there are more than ten thousand of those.”

Nonetheless, Bianculli devotes a whole chapter to the family sitcom. A straightward and historical omnipresence, it is a varietal defined in its very existence by being based at home. Home base of course is also where breakfast most often occurs. Sure, we all treat ourselves to the occasional Sunday (or weekly if you are a city millenialite) brunch on the town, but breakfast is typically fast, easy (unlike this blog) and consumed at one’s own table while your lover rifles through the fridge. 

Breakfast also has lots of opportunity for humor. Did someone forget their pants? Is someone else choking on spoiled milk? Did the toast burn or the juice spill?

So aside from the obvious breakfast is just the beginning and “most important” meal of the day, there does seem to be more  to unpack here. From my early years obsessing over Step by Step to the recent wonderfullness of Fresh off the Boat the family breakfast is a mainstay and yet somehow rather elusive.

What’s baffling to me is that googling this reaps no reward. Why should it be so bloody hard to find an article on the sitcom and the morning meal? I can find hits on notable restaurant scenes in television or what food every character in Modern Family would be (very stupid what idiot bothered to write this?!) but nobody it seems has delved into the fact that practically every episode of the charming new Speechless opens with someone eating bacon. I mean c’mon there has to be a far more intelligent conversation than the fact Hailey would be grapes if she were a fruit?! * editor’s note this may or may not be true – I somehow couldn’t work up the energy to actually click and read that load of rubbish.

This inability to research is hard for me. We’ve already discussed (a few blogs back) my desire for another to do the work. I like to go down rabbit holes of discovery -- collecting inconsequential factoids reported by braniacs and plagiarize (kidding!) their most interesting content. Like I’ve previously mentioned; even before I could actually write I wanted to be a writer (it sounded much easier then) and this was best accomplished by copying books which had already been read to me. I just prefer citation to original content. How am I supposed to explain to you the theory and history behind breakfast in situational family comedies if no one before me has bothered? You can’t actually expect me to come up with all of this on my own?! I’m a personal trainer not a television academic! Though I suppose I do fancy myself a bit of a culture savant (thank you NYT, Vanity Fair and NPR)

But no matter, now that the contemplation has commenced my curiosity is undeniably piqued. I can’t help but wonder if aside from the clearly obvious simplicity in the fact that the family day starts in the kitchen breakfast also might just be a really good place for product placement. And since advertising is just the proverbial cinnamon-butter and toast to any network sitcom this alone is a clear enough incentivize for writers to include oatmeal. How many commercials center around the morning routine weather it be a vitamin, a cereal bar or an espresso machine? Somehow breakfast seems to hit more opportunities for the ad-guys than many other scenarios. And what do you grab once you’ve finished your Kashi Go Lean and Fage greek yogurt? Why your Volvo sedan car keys and lunch sack with a Bumble Bee tuna sandwich, of course! *editor’s note: where’s my commercial paycheck? 

Aside from which, food just hits all our primal instincts. It is one of those unavoidable facts of life that both keeps us alive and brings us together (yes, even those families who wisely spend 90% of their days avoiding one another). This inclination to nurture oneself (both physically and metaphorically) is primal and thusly no matter how unrealistic (re: unrelatable) your sweet wholesome family sitcom is this inevitable consumption is a near constant event even your most neurotic of viewer can sympathize with on some level. Building upon this foundation of our very existence is not only ripe for comedic opportunity but (again) it is just great for advertising. And while dining is of course not at all exclusive to morning, and plenty of chain restaurants and event based businesses who want in on advertising can find opportunity in other meals, this proves more difficult for writers to feature quite as consistently. If a cast were to eat out every single episode they will start to seem just a little too unrealistic and Hollywood to your average viewer. Not to mention it’s just more likely the entire family will be at least somewhat present in the morning (and possibly funnier as they are likely hungover and grumpy). Grabbing a pop tart while you turn your nose up at Mommy’s burnt pancakes week after week will get a chuckle or at least a nod from just about anyone, New York and Montana alike. Conversely, there are “eateries” you will see sitcom actors spend endless hours inside. From the now classic Cheers and Friends to more contemporary features like New Girl, cafes and bars are just as much a sitcom mainstay as the breakfast table. The world always has 10 bucks for coffee and wine (not necessarily in that order) and this is a perfect fit for a sub-genre of the family sitcom-- the one more realistic to my 30-something city compatriots where friends have become the family.

But, since  we’ve already determined I’m generally not a scholar of television and I’ve already managed to drone on and on (light and breezy my skinny little arse) let’s return to what I’m really here to do -- share my moments as a watcher.  So, while I give you a moment reprieve to ruminate on the unexplored yet complicated ideals behind morning nutrition and television I’ll brief you a bit on the comedy which finally made me realize breakfast was a thing...

The Mick which stars Kaitlin Olson (who also executive produces the show) of the very funny It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, frequently gathers their unruly and unlikely cast inside the kitchen. The kitchen is a smart locale for ashow thriving on physical humor and slapstick. The knives, booze and food alone are enough to cover most storylines.

Perhaps the “sweetest” breakfast opening to this underrated show (which in spite of itself just finished a full 20-episode second season), is when little Ben (played flawlessly by Jack Stanton) the absolute most darling, insightfully dumb child presently on TV is eating spaghetti and ketchup for breakfast while feeling sad he was the one kid left out of an all-class sleepover party while the cruel but loving adults in his life plot miserable ways to get back at the horrid, mean child who left out their Ben.

The thing is, as a whole this show should just be stupid and raunchy but individually I’ve fallen for each character in that can’t help but root for the underdog kind of way, and so week after week I actually look forward to catching up with this crew of horrible misfits. The basic premise of the show is as follows: Messy and poor Aunt Mickey is left as sole guardian to her sisters’ children whose parents have fled from the cops and later are arrested for tax evasion and whatever other things rich people wind up in trouble over.

As I learned from my Bianculi readings the original comedy storyline of a family member taking in wayward orphans stems from Bachelor Father which premiered in 1957 when John Forsythe  took in  his niece after her parents were killed in a car crash. This idea has been classically and cleverly retooled by many fabulous comedians including the late, great Bernie Mac. It is notable that it took over a decade for television to feature a single female guardian (TV is sexist— what?!). All that being said, Mickey has by no means taken the responsibility of these children on soley herself, nor does what Mickey do really classify as parenting per se. What is unique about Mickey’s venture into “parenthood” is the typical roles are abruptly flipped. By caring for her seemingly horrible, spoiled niece and nephews Mickey finds herself in a very Jeffersonian moment. Gone are the days of the poor little orphans being rescued by Daddy Warbucks, replaced instead by the tremendous great fortune of the grownups. Mickey moves herself and her boyfriend from their pathetic impoverished lives to the Pemberton mansion and she declares herself and the somewhat abused Mexican house cleaner, Alma (the very funny Carla Jimenez) queens of the castle. For all intents and purposes this charitable act (like everything Mickey does) is 100% self serving but in the spirit of reliable television breeds hours of hilarious family dynamics. I like most everything about this dysfunctional families’ misadventures but most of all the the youngest Pemberton child, the aforementioned very sweet and not even slightly precocious Ben and the genuine goodwill he unwittingly stirs in those around him.

The relationship between the endlessly impressionable Ben and his Aunt Mickey who in spite of her best intentions with Ben is just an intrinsically flawed and unapologetically self-destructive human being are always the funniest moments of each 22 minute episode. I love that this show somehow warms my heart while still holding capital on modern-day gross out tv, all the while never once being endearing or making any character learn a lesson.

One of the best episodes to date, aptly titled The Church and premiering in a timely fashion during lent, opens early morning to the children finding Mickey facetiming with Alma who is speeding through town in one of the families’ very expensive cars. Mickey explains she bet Alma that she couldn’t buy smokes and return in under 5 minutes.

Just then Alma crashes the car through the mansions entrance.

She is terribly injured (no fear everyone on this show is seemingly made of titanium and has 30 lives) but made it back just in the nick of time, cigarettes in hand.

Cut to the hospital and Alma realizing she has totaled yet another Maserati.

“Send me to rehab,” the poor woman groans.

Mickey absolutely refuses, citing the many musicians rehab has ruined. “I don’t want you to lose your zip I just don’t want you to die,” she explains.

Instead Mickey decides on church. Even though she isn’t religious she likes church, free donuts, coffee, a little wine to take the edge off, confess your sins and get to go home guilt free.

“The point isn’t to believe in god, just to reset dials a bit,” Mickey continues, suddenly deciding the whole  family will be attending the following Sunday. “All our souls could use a little oil change.”

And so the episode ensues filled with lots of frighteningly raunchy physical comedy and dark humor as the Pemberton family, Alma, Mickey and Jimmy try to navigate and thusly destroy modern day Catholicism.

And as is apt to happen in any 22 minute stylings of network comedy the episode ends just where it began. We find the crew in the hospital, adults injured and  recommitted to their drug and alcohol (ab)use and the children as blasphemous as ever. Only sweet little Ben my gem of naivete seems to have transitioned from a staunch child agnostic to the idealistic misgiving that he may one day be Pope.

Don’t worry though even he’s let that go by the following episode which opens to all the children staring at their phones intently while eating breakfast -- an act which sends Mickey (and the episode itself) into a rant about living in reality. This of course ultimately turns out to be a terrible idea. Though I must admit technology does not fare much better.

And since I did promise and this blog has already become an encyclopedic novel of sorts anyhow, before I leave you here’s a Goop gag from Modern Family.

Mira Sorvino spoofs Gwynnie (and nails it!) as she plays the founder of “Nerp”.  Hiring Hailey to be her personal assistant she explains: “I want to turn Nerp into the next Disney Facebook Tesla Botox.”

Then she shows Hailey her crystal energy stickers which clearly heal the colon.

In a later episode when she goes out of town to judge a Placenta Cooking Contest in Nepal (yes, you read that right) she loans the family her estate in Santa Barbara for a wine weekend. 

Mitch: “Wow your boss launches one style website and she can afford all this!? I wish 1950s closeted father was a look people were clamoring for.”

Hailey in turn explains the formula for Nerp is much more complicated than just a style website... 

There’s more here I promise, if you hate the trend of marketing garbage (re: functional everything) in the form of health and still like Modern Family even a little bit I recommend tuning in. This unabashed mocking of Goop is the best thing to come out of this somewhat tired (in spite of all it’s coffee-fueled breakfasts’) sitcom in a long time.

[iluvtv]

A fight for funny because it can’t all be political...

I have not even remotely lost my love of sharing the passion of the vice (or fuck it, christ-- can TV be my religion?!) I’ve just been all consumed these past few weeks working on a blog that’s quickly turned encyclopedic (you can take the girl out of that thesis course she took ten years ago on the Encyclopedic Novel but you can’t take the encyclopedia out of the girl). In time it will be fine-tuned enough to share (I know you’re dying with anticipation), meanwhile we all need a comedic reprieve...

or cry? Same dif (it’s all cathartic).

So to unabashedly copy one of my favorite podcasts Pop Culture Happy Hour  here’s what’s making me happy this week:

Mainly this:

John Mulaney’s first return to SNL as host was absolutely fucking hilarious. I laughed hysterically all alone in my apartment during this monologue and haven’t been able to stop thinking about it all day. The whole thing is hilarious but I think my favorite part (especially after having refused to participate in all evening invites this weekend) was his suggestion for new music for my generation: “Every new song is about how we only have tonight. That is such 19 year old garbage. I want to write songs for people in their 30′s called: Tonight’s no good, how about Wednesday? Oh you’re in Houston on Wednesday? Well then how about we just don’t see eachother for six months and it doesn’t matter at all?”

Preach, brother! How is TV not religion?

Anyway, if they are true friends it really doesn’t matter at all because apparently once you’ve gotten to BFF status you’ve already spent more than enough time together. According to this new study it takes 100 hours to become true friends with someone. Fantastic, this explains why I only like my family, my childhood friends and my clients (and my TV of course). I learned this bit of news from one of my oldest favorite radio shows (been listening with my Mom since before I can remember). Wait Wait... Don’t Tell Me always makes me happy and this week with the fabulous Laurie Metcalf was absolutely no different

And since I’ve already veered from television exclusivity I may as well mention the book I can’t put down. Yes, completely obsessed with Jacqueline Susann’s The Love Machine. I tend to get a little culty about mid-century pulp fiction and after finding  Dolores on the street I was flooded with warm flash-backs to the summer I was 19 when I spent my days in a bikini drinking 40′s smoking blunts and reading on Santa Cruz beaches (before riding my neighbor’s beach cruiser to Mirimar Fish Grotto to bus tables in the evening). This was a simpler time when emo was in and a paperback copy of Valley of the Dolls was easily one of the best ways to spend a tipsy weekday afternoon (tied of course by The Bell Jar). Anyhow, this surprise finding inspired a glance and I quickly realized I may have grown up quite a bit since 2003 but I certainly haven’t outgrown Susann. This of course spurred a journey down Google Lane where I found this gem of a bio-piece from a Vanity Fair archive of the early aughts. Even if you don’t have the patience or interest for Susann’s books spend some time working through her history. I am more convinced than ever that I too must be a writer. This batty lady was remarkable. I love her and she makes me terribly happy.

what’s making you happy?

[iluvtv]

Roseanne: A Little Love Letter

Roseanne was some of the first TV I truly loved.

Most of my youthful TV obsessions always left me a tad deflated. Sure, I usually wrapped the 30-minute escape inspired to be as pretty, well-dressed, popular and loving to my family as its fictional characters yet equally unsure of how to achieve this daunting feat. Roseanne meanwhile was different.

Easy to tune into (on syndication after school when my parents weren’t paying much attention) it’s characters and content were precious in part because it was more a staple of accessible hilarity than fantasy.  I’d liken the show to those modern-day relatable and slightly naughty memes which make you giggle. All the other glossy family sitcoms of its day were more akin to a 2018 instagram feed which I eventually will unfollow after realizing scrolling through pictures of hashtag goals and bestlifes aren’t doing jack-shit for my psyche.

So ya, I guess I loved Roseanne for all those reasons tv writers are discussing: it was breaking boundaries, challenging the status-quo and finding a charming way to make network tv of the late 20th century subversive.... but I never really thought about it this way. At the time I loved Roseanne because, well... the Mom yelled, they didn’t have enough money for name-brand groceries or clothes, the kids fought, the parents had gay friends and hey, the baby brother even looked like my own. I loved it because it was my life but maybe a little harder but also perhaps a little happier. I loved it because it was funny.

I suppose this was the point. To be groundbreaking without being pretentious.

I also loved Roseanne for a totally different reason. Roseanne and Dan’s. relationship was unlike any I’d ever witnessed. Sure they fought (usually fair) but more to the point they made eachother laugh. It was clear no matter how rough things got they were always on the same team. This sweet take on love was so different from the misery of marriage I saw in real life. I pined for their love -- hard. Today when I think of my own “happy ending” I picture a man who will just hang around and take the piss out of things with me. I have one married friend who achieved this. When Shona and Miguel are together they are usually just laughing at how dumb their lovely kids are.  These are genuine relationshipgoals. Roseanne and Dan were mine before it was a hashtag.

On that note I am looking forward to watching the show’s reboot while also not feeling overly hyped or an impending sense of urgency to view. Instead I am steadily preparing.... reading the literature, rewatching the pivotal episodes suggested to me by way of the NYT and generally reminiscing on how happy this show once made me.

I’m glad this ensemble decided to stick with their roots and bypass streaming options (and thusly a free-range to swearing) and instead keep things simple. By premiering one new episode at a time on network TV Roseanne proves they know their base.  Sure, in part this choice is Hollywood bigwigs who last January realized they were going to have to start speaking to Middle America a bit but it’s also a nice appreciation to people like me. Little girls who maybe once had no cable, no streaming, no flat screen tv and maybe were even tuning in with a coat hanger on a TV they found on the street and hid in their closet just so they could escape from their own family antics and go watch a different fat lady yell at different petulant children. The view through the screen was somehow always funnier than in my own kitchen.

And for this Roseanne, I love you.

[iluvtv]

Make Comedy TV Reality (Again)

I was recently charmed by GameFace, a lovely little British show. Suggested to me by an algorithm created by some brilliant mind at Hulu, I zipped through its teensy first season and am “literally” salivating for more. 

Roisin Conaty created, wrote and stars in all six hilariously concise episodes where she plays Marcella, a terribly funny antiheroine of sorts (seemingly based on Conaty’s own misadventures).

Conaty portrays this sympathetic “sad-sack” without a shred of shame. Assertive in her own misgivings, Marcella is no Bridget Jones (though we do thank Fielding for bringing mass attention to the still single in your 30′s, likes a daily drink with dinner and may or may not have spilled sauce on her jumper genre). The first episode opens with Marcella playing an unenthusiastic and extremely hungover Cinderella at a little girls’ birthday party. As an actress this is her career trajectory, As a human this is her personality trajectory.

Since she is passed out with her hand in a candy jar (which for all intents and purposes could actually be classified as entertainment) the birthday child’s mother kicks her out, explaining impatiently: “you do not show up around children with red wine lips.”

In turn Marcella mocks the Mother’s tone and the severity of this infraction. We haven’t even hit the opening credits yet and I can clearly see Marcella and I are soul mates.

Contay’s character is consistently and unapologetically herself and since something about her is just so charming she gives us all permission to follow suit. Or perhaps by nature I already am this way and that is why I love her.

What elevates this show from hot mess to sardonic, culturally relevant rhetoric is Conaty’s creative wit.  Aside from her refusal to shy away from divisive content like say a drug addicted brother or a one-night stand who has never heard of or seen an episode of Friends before, Conaty’s cleverness shines most through the means to which she gives us true insight and thusly investment into Marcella, who otherwise might just turn into a punchline.

Much of her background is revealed through sessions with her Life Coach. Essentially a therapeutic farce, her coach is a gift from Marcella’s Mother, purchased (of course) on Groupon. 

This history including her relationship with her mother (seemingly an enabler) her ex (seeming a codependent who broke her heart) her driving instructor (seemingly a real catch if she weren’t still caught up on the ex) her brother (definitely a drug addict though attempting recovery) her father (seemingly a narcissist) and her bestie flat-mates (as layered as any long term female friendships always will be) are shown in real time, intercepted with flashbacks interspersed with Marcella’s own story-line (generally trending in her own favor) told to her coach.

She also has random dream-ilke interludes one including a black and white shot of an old woman reading the newspaper with a front page article titled: “Why didn’t you have kids you no good stupid woman?”

In essence, we slowly become privy to all of Marcella’s hopes and fears without Conaty shoving anything down our throat, becoming too preachy or expecting too much from her complicated characters.

I like to assume this is because we are all complex and there are good days and bad days so why bother to put us into boxes?

I of course urge you to watch all six short episodes but if you’re back-logged on watching recommendations here are a few stand out jokes I just feel everyone should be in on immediately! No spoilers, just laughs:

The aforementioned Friends Virgin (I suppose this representation of supreme cultural ignorance is a commentary of sorts on Marcella’s tendency to fall for only extremely flawed men) staying uninvited all afternoon in Marcella’s flat giggling at each 90′s episode with a doe-eyed freshness  and Marcella’s flatmate ringing her to ask when this loser will be leaving “He’s freaking me out. He’s never seen Friends!”

Juxtaposed with Marcella’s attempt to save a suicidal woman on roof which  only reveals her own life is just far more pathetic. Suicidal woman asks, “You’ve had sex with someone who has never seen Friends?”

Marcella’s bafflement at her ex’s new wife. She explains to her Life Coach that it is a total head-fuck that this woman is a mess. “Those are all the things I thought he hated about me.”

Marcella’s mum on paper towels “they’re really good ones. More absorbancy than sand.”

The fact that the only entry in Marcella’s Gratefulness Journal is “Peas.”

Or that Marcella and her ex essentially broke up after seven years over the purchase of the wrong color root. “It was a row about onions that got out of hand.”

Marcella’s relationship with her fucked-up brother might be the absolute most precious part of this show (for me). There are moments  between them that are simultaneously lovely, snarky, mean, endearing and absolutely hilariously realistic. Like this, “I love you too, duck face. But we need to get one thing straight I didn’t eat 17 arancini balls I ate 24”

But just when things get touching we are given this gem: Life Coach asks “when was the time you reaped the rewards of perseverance?” A flashback scene unfolds featuring Marcella in her friend’s car finishing a donut and subsequently needing to poo so badly she very well may soil self. Through my hands I cringe watching Marcella’s roommate find a gas station and Marcella desperately banging on the toilet doors until finally evacuated by a child. She barely makes it in, but she does. Sigh of relief from me as we cut to real time and Marcella telling the Coach “Probably most focused I’ve been in my entire life.”

Or that moment in the grocery store when Marcella didn’t grab a basket and is holding so many items she drops the eggs and literally gives zero fucks. Story of my life.

Or Marcella’s inability to connect to viable men and her roommates response. “You have the MySpace of vaginas. Obsolete.” Other story of my life.

And for another charmingly relatable story told to the Life Coach through flashbacks, we see  Marcella hanging out with her rich trust-fund, 24-year-old costars. This familiar scene of dining with pretentious, entitled millennials when one has no money is painted through sepia tones and severe dramatic acting,  a visual minefield much like a beautifully produced war-scene, culminating in Marcella who has eaten and drank almost nothing (in a meager attempt towards financial-preservation) being forced to split the bill anyhow.

And lastly, Marcella telling her date “If my dad was a food he’d be mustard. Completely overpowering and mad.”

And if all this wasn’t relatable enough, one extra bonus is wardrobe realism! Marcella’s dress (even when not wearing costumes for “work”) is fairly glittery and fabulously ostentatious is true to the point of repeats. She clearly (as we all do) has a few splashy favorite tops which appear and reappear in multiple episodes.

Thank you Roisin Conaty for making TV real again.

[iluvtv]

TV Dinners

Just two quick recommendations for all my avid followers (I’m lookin’ at you Mom and Dad!)

First of all watch the opening Monologue from this week’s Saturday Night Live to see Sterling K Brown, himself, make fun of all the crying that goes down on This is Us .... talk about timing!

See, some demographics get me?!

Also, last month one of my very favorite podcasts, The Sporkful, featured an interview with June Thomas, TV critic and managing editor of Slate podcasts, in an episode perfectly titled Eat Fish and Chips By Hand -- But Not While Watching TV. All the banter between Thomas and host Dan Pashman was hilarious but the highlight here are her clear cut rules regarding the comforts of television viewing whilst consuming calories. The entire ordeal leading to relaxation was just so darn relatable and perfect. Also, her British accent makes the often less than classy and at times shame-inducing (yet utterly normal) experience sound absolutely lovely. 

Do yourself a favor take advantage of the terrible time change and before you plop in front of the TV with your dinner tonight take a walk while streaming this episode (in 1.5 speed of course -- the podcast, not the walk, slow that part down and enjoy the flowers... spring is coming!)