The Studio: Season 1

To think this could have been my life. Or at least the life I imagined for myself. Because I’m an unrealistic punk who has none of the smarts, chutzpah or general lack of scruples needed to make it in Hollywood. At least to the levels to which our characters climb. Granted, I just wanted to be a dude in the back room reading scripts and stuff. Alas, it was not to be after one Scott Rudin shook that shit right out of me. That’s a story for another day, though. This is a story about The Studio, a series that I thought was going to be one thing — a smart, meta parody of the Hollywood machine — but turned out to be a more slapstick, drugged-out version of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Mostly because Seth Rogen is, in his body and in his soul, a deeply awkward and cringey individual not afraid to look like a complete jackass, which translates incredibly well to the screen.

I suppose we should get the fact that a show called The Studio is being aired by a tech company. A show about a studio head who values and reveres the golden age of the studio system and the films of that era. The operative word being “film.” Both the celluloid and the theaters in which they are shown. Produced for a platform in Apple TV+ and Apple itself who is one of the biggest culprits in the rapid decline of the big screen and avowed technologists that have brought down the need for fidelity in the industry. Because, no, most directors did not think and rethink every shot and camera move and spend years of their lives so that you could watch their masterpiece on a six-inch iPhone screen.

Putting aside the irony of the whole endeavor, I went into this with way too much “prestige” television in my head. I just knew this show would have to go dark, maybe there’d be a murder and Rogen’s Matt Remick character would have to break bad. A marauding anti-hero battling big Kool-Aid. And if not that, a sly meta-commentary about corporate greed versus art versus whatever else Rogen had in mind. But, no, that’s not really what we get at all. This is a sitcom. Granted, a really nice-looking one where Remnick is constantly falling over things, people are doing little Veep insult runs and farcical nonsense and goofy shit happens. All while Remnick and his crew of buffoons seem to go out of their way to wreck everything they purport to love. I’m honestly not sure if any of it makes any sense in reality, but it’s really fun getting there. And since it is ultimately a week-to-week sitcom, whatever happens in week three doesn’t necessarily affect week four. So, if they really screw something up, Springfield essentially goes back to its default state next week and Bart is ten forever. So we don’t have to watch Remnick spiral into anxiety and depression as he totally hoses his personal and professional career.

Remnick is crowned the new head of Continental Studios. We have to assume this is an old-school, long-standing film studio who is fighting the good fight against the streamers and the tech companies and whatnot in the new era. He’s replacing his former mentor and bad-ass, Patty Leigh (Catherine O’Hara), who was seemingly unceremoniously pushed out — though she gets her redemption arc with a producer deal that is probably a better place for her to be anyway. He has his right-hand man and friend, Sal Saperstein (Ike Barinholtz), who loves Matt, cocaine and ascending the studio ladder. Then there is a small group of junior execs and a seriously turnt-up Kathryn Hahn as the head of marketing, Maya Mason. Doing her typical weird vaguely (or not-so-vaguely) over-the-top NY Jewish schtick, which is, frankly, getting kind of old. I’m sure it’s based on someone or many someones in the industry, but it’s just too big and too, uh, ethnic for her to just keep doing this being who she is. Anyway, they are all under the pressure of being the new kids on the block asked to balance making art with keeping the studio financially afloat in an era of cross-promotion and making the Kool-Aid movie starring Ice Cube as Kool-Aid. Which is pretty funny, actually.

Each week Matt and his crew need to put out some sort of fire that either threatens to unravel the studio, or satiate Matt’s fragile ego and insecurity. There are guest stars galore, most of which are used awesomely. Often playing against type — which is a trope, I know, but remains funny nonetheless. He has to deliver a bad note to Ron Howard — notoriously one of Hollywood’s nicest guys — and they spend the episode basically playing hot potato about who has to tell him that his film is incredibly overwrought and boring. Howard’s reaction to their feedback is not in character and things go… sideways. Olivia Wilde does a cameo as herself, leaning into the probably-overblown rumors of the chaos on set of the directorial wreckage of Don’t Worry Darling, doing her best imitation of an outsized version of the worst of what the rumors could have become. But mostly it’s Rogen just getting humiliated over and over again in front of or by people he respects like Charlize Theron (after making his idol, Martin Scorsese cry), Greta Lee and a multitude of others. Zoë Kravitz has a great multi-episode arc as herself, making me miss her charismatic and comedic turn in High Fidelity all that much more. Bryan Cranston running around in his underwear has to be an homage to his oft-pantsless Malcolm in the Middle character, and reminds us that the dude is a genius physical actor.

But it does ultimately always come back to Rogen being incredibly cringey and broken. Jealousy over Ike’s old non-friendship with Adam Scott. His need to be publicly thanked at the Golden Globes so his mom Rhea Perlman’s friends, who are watching on TV, know he’s a big macher. The desperate need to be loved and admired the same way he loved and admired his idols. But clueless that nobody in this current environment knows or cares who the head of a dying studio is. He’s not a creative. He’s not an actor. He’s barely a public figure, and that kills him. So he picks the most Curb fight of them all: arguing with a bunch of children’s cancer doctors at a gala to which his seemingly perfect doctor girlfriend, Rebecca Hall, has brought him that he pretty much has the same job they do. Or at least one as important as theirs. Needless to say, it’s absurd and uncomfortable and ends in irony and no more Rebecca Hall. Basically everyone on this show is pretty much a jag. But somehow not unlikable. That’s kind of Rogen’s brand, lovable loser. But in this case he’s a lovable loser with a huge job, nice cars and the world (or at least Hollywood) at his fingertips. But he’s still a loser. Or a dork, I guess. Which is so much funnier than if he and his crew of misfits were completely competent and trying to undo the corporate takeover of the film industry, or whatever we thought this show was going to be. Nope, no murders. Not even much intrigue. Just funny scenarios that involve diarrhea, punching, falling over, inside jokes, drugs and lots and lots of cool “oner” shots. It just seems they have an unlimited number of things they could do with this show — especially if they keep using their guest stars in such a smart way — and will only build on their repertoire as the show progresses in subsequent seasons. And it stays as original Veep and not the Veep that devolved into escalating juvenile insult humor. Hopefully.