Nathan for You (2013-17)

After watching The Rehearsal, I felt compelled to go back and see where the madness came from.  Indeed there are a couple of episodes that presage what will become The Rehearsal, specifically Smokers Allowed and Finding Frances.  What really makes the show work is the huge budget Nathan Fielder gets to work with and the oddball cast of characters he finds (the Bill Gates impersonator makes several appearances, including his own feature-length film). He always takes it just a step too far given all the money to do whatever he wants, and the results are absurd hilarity. I believe that this isn't scripted, and he takes it wherever it will go. He just manages to always get it to go in the wildest place possible. I would say highlights for me: Haunted House, Gas Station, Smokers Allowed, and Souvenir Shop.

Death of a Salesman (Broadway) (2022)

I made it through high school without having read Arthur Miller's classic American Dream tragedy. I've never known another Willy Loman. And much like Marianne Elliott's revival of Company, she (along with Miranda Cromwell) reimagined the play in a new light so inspired and convincing it's hard to believe it wasn't the original. This Loman family is black and it works so well I can't even imagine Philip Seymour Hoffman and Andrew Garfield. The American dream exists for white people; it's much more difficult for African Americans. It also sort of raises the question of what the American Dream is. Is it home ownership? I always thought it was owning your own business. Maybe it's just raising kids who do better than the previous generation. I suppose it's up for interpretation.

The set is very Marianne Elliott. The furniture descends from the ceiling on wires. The rooms move back and forth, without walls. For some reason, the set is crooked, not aligned to the edge of the stage but on a bit of an angle. It makes the theater feel a little off. I love the music, folksy depressing music, strummed on a guitar (kind of like Girl From the North Country?). It's obviously not a musical, but how could you not give Andre DeShields and Sharon Clarke a song, right? They're excellent. Clarke is a shoo in for the Tonys, but I did say the same about Caroline, or Change. 

I did doze off a little bit in the first act during one of Willy's hallucinations/memories. It's a very long show, over 3 hours. It's very powerful, very emotional, devastating really. It's certainly not for the Lion King crowd, but tourists that recognize the title will find an exquisite production. The theater wasn't full unfortunately or unfortunately, we had no one in front of us.

Killing Eve (2018-22)

Killing Eve maybe outlasted its welcome a bit. The first season was phenomenal. The second one was even good. But I simply didn't find seasons three or four all that interesting. The plot became far too convoluted to follow. Early on though, when Phoebe Waller-Bridge led the writing staff, the show was funny and sharp and exciting and surprising. Villanelle and Eve were two of the best female drama characters on TV. Sandra Oh and Jodie Comer have great chemistry. They're both alluring but what is so subversive is the attraction between the deadly assassin and the obsessive agent. It's a bummer Sandra Oh never won an Emmy, but kooky Jodie Comer did land a victory for season 2. The finale episode did leave me unsatisfied. I felt like there was some explanatory closure missing. But I also didn't really want to watch more because the final season wasn't that enjoyable.