Schmigadoon!

Trailer: https://bit.ly/3zdOUML

This show is so whacked that you've got to watch the two available episodes just to marvel at the creativity. In a world where everybody just repeats what everybody else does, I've never seen a show quite like this.

Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key are doctors who go on a retreat to improve their relationship and end up in a musical. With all the musical tropes. There's no effort to make it appear like reality, that's just the point, musicals never are real, I mean who walks down the street and bursts into song?

As for the songs... They're all brand new and creative...the lyrics trump the melodies, but there are melodies and the words all have meaning and it's a trip back to the fifties and sixties when music was about musicals and if you couldn't sing it, they didn't write and record it.

So, Cecily and Keegan-Michael are alternately wowed and horrified/terrified by the musical they've found themselves inside of. Are these people for real? And what about their agendas? Kristin Chenoweth, the preacher's wife, has banned most of the books from the library and is against living in sin so this couple who've been together for years can't sleep together.

And there's the bad boy Danny Bailey.

And the mayor, Alan Cumming, who is brilliant, who must spread love and happiness but isn't always up to being gay, but Cecily wonders, is he gay? And Martin Short plays a leprechaun and...should you really listen to leprechauns?

So, Key is trying to figure out the game whereas Cecily just wants to play along and they can't escape and...

You're sitting there howling!

It's kind of like a Christopher Guest mockumentary, but not really. Because the two main characters aren't buying it. And the people involved are not delusional. You're not laughing at them so much as the ridiculous situations.

Now this show is hobbled by being on Apple TV+. In that they're dribbling out episodes once a week, which is a flawed strategy. Read Rich Greenfield's take on addiction: https://bit.ly/2UrSbtd

Bottom line, Apple would be better off releasing "Ted Lasso" all at one time. But the people in control at the Cupertino giant, or the Hollywood drones they've hired, are so mired in old school thinking that they don't understand how it works today.

So, will I watch "Ted Lasso" week by week or wait until it's all over so I can binge?

I'm leaning towards the latter, at least I'll be able to remember what happens from episode to episode.

This also means I can't vouch for the entire "Schmigadoon!" series because not only have I only seen two episodes, but I must say the second episode wasn't quite up to the first.

Too many of the reviews didn't get the show. They were taking it too seriously. They were busy analyzing it on a macro level whereas it's on a micro level that it succeeds. Some things are so ridiculous, such spot-on parodies of regular musicals, that you split your sides. And that's what we're looking for in comedies, not perfection, but the ability to crack us up on a regular basis enough to make the time worthwhile.

Really, "Schmigadoon!" reminds me of the sixties, when everything was up for grabs, and praise was heaped on those who broke the construct, who engaged their wildest imaginations and blew our minds. Same deal in music. But this was all before big money was involved. Hell, today's story about Ackman and Universal is bigger than any of the music on the label. It's about creativity. I have no idea what it took to green light this project, but I hope the creative team didn't have to jump through too many hoops. You've got to give creative people the cash and let them go. If you demand demos, proof, you take the air out of the project. You've got to be in a crazy place to create something like "Schmigadoon!," and if you're paying for it your goal is to eliminate all distractions and let people go, because then you might end up with something as crazy and deranged yet infectious as "Schmigadoon!"


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