The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

in other sort of related news

i was talking to my friend’s mother about Mrs Maisel because we both love the show. She is a wonderful 80-year woman who grew up in Brooklyn. I was laughing with her about Miriam’s bedtime routine in the first episode, going to bed & waking up in full makeup etc & no shit, she said that she did the EXACT same thing. Her husband never saw her without makeup! She even puts on mascara when she gets up in the morning because she hates looking at her face in the mirror without it. Incredible.

Way late on this, we just started watching this a few weeks ago and we're about 2/3rds through Season 2. Really enjoying this so far, much more than I expected to - the description way upthread (haven't read much further than the first handful of posts) of a musical without songs is pretty otm.

My wife and son are also in the midst of a Gilmore Girls binge, so the similarities between the shows feel a little more glaring in that context.

I watched Down With Love over the weekend and it gave a strong Maisel vibe.

Down with Love is a little gem.

sitting through the final episode

as always, the question i have is how can a show and a star be so, so funny and sharp and well written until the stand up scene each episode which is as flat and weighty and awkward as anything youll see

like how the worst part of every mad men was the fucking ad pitch

in fact i blame.sex and the city

There's a fundamental problem there, right, because in universe Midge is hilarious and as with a show where there's a song or a movie everyone finds amazing that already raises expectations in an unhelpful way. But also they seem to have no idea how stand-up actually works, she's constantly doing "off the cuff material I just came up with" and killing with it.

I don't know if I'd call the last season sharp and well written tho, I enjoyed it but mostly due to a combination of actor's charmingness + gorgeous setpieces + period popcult porn. Final scene worked tho.

The acting is bad in the stand up routines, not just the writing. She’s delivering it like a monologue, not standup. Her accent is dire, too.

maybe its an entire meta comment on the "my friend is incredibly funny go see their stand up"

I don't think it explains or forgives the stand up scenes for not being great, but fwiw Amy Sherman-Palladino was talking on Maron's podcast about how it was an intentional choice for Midge's act to not sound at all like a stand-up act from that era.