Actor testing the boundaraies
PICKOFTHEWEEK TheDuchess, Netflix
Is there a limit tohowunlikeable a comedian canmaketheirown character before people start putting their footdownand refusing to watch their show?
Katherine Ryan seems to be testing the boundaries in hernewNetflix series TheDuchess, but luckily she’s funny enough to getawaywith it.
Bestknownfor her twoNetflix stand-up specials ( In Trouble and GlitterRoom) andappearances on various British panel shows, Ryan plays a version of herself that could loosely be described as Evil Lorelai Gilmore. That is, a free-spirited single mumwhose best friend is, slightly unhealthily, her precocious 9-yearold daughter Olive (Katy Byrne).
Her other best friend is her business partner, and probably the show’s funniest character, Bev (Michelle de Swarte), withwhomshe shares a boutique ceramic business that seems to exclusively produce vases with boobs. ThrowOlive’s dad, Shep (Rory Keenan), into the mix, an ex-boy bandmemberwholives on ahouseboat and looks like if Gary Barlowwasin the cast of Trainspotting, andhernewman, the extremely lovely dentist Evan (Australian comedian Steen Raskopoulos), whoshe insistson keeping at arm’s length despitehim being the perfect boyfriend, andwe can fit the show’s core cast into a single car.
Katherine wants another baby. She could always commit to lovely Evan and start a family with him, but instead decides to pursue every single other avenue available, and ultimately chooses the worst possible option— to have another child with her ex, whoshe absolutely hates. The easy-to watch six-episode series (still
the optimal series length, and one of The Duchess’ biggest selling points) follows her on that ill-advised and self-destructive journey. She might be hard to like a lot of the time, but it’s also hard not to laugh.
WORTHWATCHING Pen15, Neon
They say if youwant a job done right you’ve got to do it yourself, a
philosophy Pen15 creatorsAnna Konkle andMayaErskine embraced wholeheartedlywhen they decided to play their tweenage selves in their semiautobiographical early-2000s set comedyseries.
They embodied their ungainly characters so well itmadewhat could potentially have been a weird and distracting gimmick
into one of the show’s strongest selling points. Season onewas one of the bestnewcomedies in ages, and season two, which just arrived on Neonhot off the Hulu servers on Friday, looks just as good.
Inside, Prime, 8.30pm Thursday
Originally scheduled to screen the weekAuckland returned to alert level 3, and pushed back a fewweeks for obvious reasons, newlocal series Inside is set in themiddle of a second waveof a deadly virus. Tech expert Rose (MorganaO’Reilly) has her reclusive lockdown world of careful hygiene practices rockedwhenshe accidentallybumpsinto her former school bully (Sam Snedden) over a newrival to Zoom. He seems remorseful, but things soon start to get a little unnerving, and the all too realistic pandemic backdrop only adds to the sense of paranoia.
MOVIEOFTHEWEEK MyOctopusTeacher, Netflix
About 10years ago film-maker Craig Fosterwasburned out and needed a change of pace. So hemovedhis family back to where he grew up, by the ocean at the tip of South Africa, and tookupdiving.
That’s where he met and befriended an octopus.
MyOctopus Teacher is a beautiful, gentle, moving documentary about that remarkable relationship between aman and the octopus that seemed to genuinely enjoy hanging out with him inthe kelp forests.
FROMTHEVAULT RomancingtheStone (1984), TVNZDuke, 9pmTuesday
Michael Douglas is one of those actors whoseems like they’ve been old forever.
But checkhim out in1984’s Romancing the Stone— relatively young, surprisinglyhandsome. He plays a rugged and adventurous bird hunter (!) whocomes to the rescue of a romancenovelist (Kathleen Turner) whenshe gets intosome strife in Colombia. Goodoldfashioned romantic, adventurous fun.