MAXXX-ED OUT
THERE’S something deliciously twisted and enjoyable about watching someone who had huge success, fame and fortune – despite clearly being a terrible human being – then go on to lose it all and come crashing back down to earth in a spectacularly public fashion.
That’s the premise behind this new sitcom, which follows former boyband star Maxxx who once had it all – number one albums with his group Boytown, world tours and millions of screaming fans, supermodel Jourdan Dunn as a girlfriend – but then lost it all (apart from his adopted son Amit), as his ego exploded, his personal life imploded and he became a drug-shamed tabloid laughing stock. But despite all evidence to the contrary, he’s convinced his public still love him and that he can make an epic comeback.
Yes, we know it’s a comedy and it’s fiction, but there definitely have to be pop stars who’ve acted as outrageously as Maxxx, and whose narcissism is equally as out of control. It’s that total lack of self-awareness and apparent inability to feel shame or embarrassment that makes him highly entertaining to watch, if also completely cringeworthy. There are some cracking lines – his former record company boss being surprised that he “kept the orphan” – and a brilliantly performed funeral scene where Maxxx brings out the power ballads and manages to put the nail in his own coffin.
It’s written by and stars O-T Fagbenle, who handles the Craig David comparisons smoothly, and it’s way darker, more grown-up and far funnier than expected.