The extraordinary playlists of our lives

IN TIMES

of darkness, music lights the way. That’s the rationale behind new musical drama series

Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, in which Jane Levy (who starred in the 2013 New Zealand-shot horror movie Evil Dead) plays a computer engineer who is suddenly able to perceive the innermost thoughts of the people around her in the form of elaborate musical numbers that they perform.

“I feel like so many things have become cynical or so edgy that they lose a bit of the joy of life,” executive producer Paul Feig tells

TimeOut during an exclusive interview in Los Angeles.

“What I love about this show is that it’s life-affirming. There’s a joyfulness about it.”

Feig is the celebrated director behind movies such as Bridesmaids and Last Christmas, and he also created the high-school drama

Freaks and Geeks, one of the most acclaimed TV shows of all time. He’s very selective about what he works on, and he tells TimeOut that creator Austin Winsberg’s pitch for

Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist warmed his heart.

“I want to make things that you can watch over and over again to cheer yourself up and make yourself feel better. I feel like that’s what this show does. Even though there’s a lot of emotion in the show, and as the series goes on there’s a lot more, it’s done in a way that’s just very hopeful. And then having the musical element on top of that just makes it more fun to watch.”

In the show, Zoey’s abilities come about following an incident involving Spotify and an MRI machine. She is suddenly exposed to world-shattering truths, like the bombshell that her platonic friend Max (played by Skylar Astin from the Pitch Perfect movies) has romantic feelings for her — revealed through Astin’s performance of David Cassidy’s 70s hit I Think I Love You.

In one of the pilot episode’s most affecting moments, Zoey’s seemingly catatonic father Mitch (Peter Gallagher from The OC) reveals that his mind is still active via a performance of Cyndi Lauper’s 1986 hit True Colours.

That particular thread was inspired by Winsburg’s own father’s decline from a degenerative disease, and Feig says that making Freaks and Geeks taught him to believe in that kind of real-life connection.

“It has to mean something to someone, and it has to come from somebody’s personal experience. When Austin first presented this to me, knowing that it was based on what he really went through with his father, I was like . . . Freaks and Geeks was my story growing up, [and it’s] the personal experience that makes your voice unique beyond anybody else’s.”

Music also played a large role in Freaks and Geeks and Last Christmas, which was inspired by the Wham! track of the same name. Feig tells TimeOut that working on Zoey’s has made him reflect on just how central music is to our lives.

“We have a soundtrack to our lives, whether we’re conscious of it or not,” says Feig. “When you hear a song, you think about who you were the first time you heard the song, or some event that happened in your life that is attached to that song, or it just puts you in a better mood or makes you sad. We are so intertwined with music that there’s no escaping it.

A life without music would be horrendous.” Dominic Corry