From Kyrgyzstan to Kazakhstan: In Which I Get in an Unmarked White Van And Live to Tell the Taleby Randi / October 25, 2017Wooot it’s Theatre Thursday y’all! Today’s review is of the new production of “Venus in Fur” in the West End, currently playing at the Theatre Royal Haymarket until December 9.
One of the Broadway shows I most regretted missing was the play “Venus in Fur”, for which the joyous and adorable Nina Arianda won a Tony in 2012 for being the literal opposite of joyous and adorable. David Ives’s play was generally referred to as a dark and twisted psychosexual…comedy? Drama? It is both, and it is neither. And that’s really all I knew about it until I finally saw it last weekend, in the form of the new West End production starring Natalie Dormer (Game of Thrones, Tudors, you all love her) and David Oakes (whom I last saw in Shakespeare in Love, the West End play, as Marlowe). It’s not the kind of show you enjoy while it’s happening, but the kind where you can’t stop trying to figure it out after the fact, which could be the more interesting option.
I love going in to shows (and movies) cold, which is harder and harder to do nowadays with every kind of spoiler and (illegal don’t do it) videos on the internet (and with my willpower to avoid such things being nonexistent). But going in to “Venus in Fur”, all I knew was the above – that it was sexual and violent. Husband and I joked about this literally every time we mentioned the play in the run up to it, because it’s one of the funniest parts of one of our favorite movies. Seriously every conversation: “What do we have next weekend?” “Venus in Fur. It’s sexual and violent.” Or “What time is the show tonight?” “7:30. It’s sexual and violent.”
I’m glad I didn’t know much more, because the twists and turns that the play takes you through are what it’s all about. They weren’t kidding about it being psychosexual – every word of it is carefully calculated to inform the psychology of dominance on display, with the roles of the powerful and weak, the dominant and the subordinate, the master and the slave, changing so often and so subtly and so swiftly that you could miss it if you aren’t fully attentive. The power dynamic between the two characters, the actress Vanda and the playwright Thomas Novachek, begins with the normal distance expected when an unaccomplished actress auditions for a role (the whole play is the one scene, Vanda’s arrival and audition). But that power differential shortens and shortens until the two have switched sides of the line, and lines of all sorts get crossed over and over as the audition gets going.
It begins in a New York loft on a stormy night, and there are claps of thunder and bolts of lightning. I thought that was a little unnecessary in the beginning but it totally works to accompany the f-ed up drama that gets going (and especially the twist ending). Thomas (Oakes), the playwright, is on the phone with his significant other, bemoaning (in a preeeetty okay American accent but you could tell it was forced and it made his voice tenor kind of annoying) that none of the actresses who auditioned for his new play were right. Enter Vanda (Dormer), carrying a broken wet umbrella and a HUGE duffel bag crammed full of who knows what and apologizing in a (very very terrible) New York accent for how late she is for her audition and that she was stuck on the subway and a guy was trying to harass her and she just talked and talked until Thomas was like, I don’t see your name, so she went on talking and talking complaining about her shitty agent and her shitty luck until he was like FINE audition just so you stop talking FFS! But the accent and the drawl and the nonstop talking continued as she offhandedly mentioned how she skimmed through the play on the subway and how it’s ‘totally S&M porn’. Thomas, the playwright, is aghast at such a statement, saying that the book it’s based on was high literature. Vanda points out that the book was written by the guy whose name is the root of ‘sado-masochism’ so it seems like she won that one. Between her horrendous accent and her sloppy attire and her nonstop unsophisticated talking, it’s clear that Thomas will never give her a chance to be in his play and that she probably is terrible anyway. She takes off her coat and under her clothes she is wearing a full leather and chain dominatrix outfit, which she explains because of the whole play-being-s&m-porn thing. He’s horrified and explains how the play takes place in like 18th century Germany or something like that between semi-aristocrats. Vanda excitedly rummages through her giant duffel and finds a cream-colored high-necked and full-skirted dress right out of the appropriate era and asks him to help her put it on.
Then she is finally about to read, and Thomas is obviously annoyed and eager to let her read a few lines then send her away. Vanda says she’ll try more of a continental accent, to which Thomas kind of scoffs, imagining it will be even worse than her regular voice. But then Dormer recites the lines in her regular perfect fancy English accent and it wouldn’t have been a surprise if Thomas dropped dead of shock. He, like the audience, was now riveted by this goddess who just a minute ago was this offensive slob. Throughout the whole first section, I was thinking ‘ohhh my god I can’t wait to complain about how they should have just had this based in London so these actors could speak in their regular accents and focus on the acting instead of these over-the-top New York fakings!’ Silly me, I had no idea how important the switching between the accents would be. And that kept repeating itself throughout this show – everything I questioned, every aspect I nitpicked, would prove to be a deliberate decision made to enhance the drama.
Throughout Vanda’s line reading, she would swiftly move in and out of her English to New York accents when she had commentary to make on the script. It was hysterical; she’d say something posh in her English voice and sit all poised and then without a beat say in the grating NYC voice ‘this is some bullshit right here Thomas’ or something like that. She kept breaking to mention how sexist this was and how a woman wouldn’t really act like that and whether this reflected Thomas’s own views and desires. As it progressed, it became clear that she had all of Vanda’s lines memorized. “I thought you said you skimmed through it once on the subway?” Thomas asked. Then Vanda’s commentary started to reference the original book the play was based on and parts of Greek & Roman mythology that inform the themes in that book. Thomas’s amazement and curiosity is echoed in the audience – how does she all of a sudden know everything about this topic and the literature behind it? Who is this person? And the answer to that question gets more and more unclear the more Vanda talks about herself and the more she develops her audition. Deeper into the play, Vanda seems to know an awful lot about Thomas and his personal life, and his significant other. But we have no idea whether any of the reasons she provides are true. And while we wonder along with Thomas about who this person is and how crazy or terrifying or dangerous she might prove to be, Vanda distracts everyone from that question by toying with Thomas with his own written words and then with her own, as they try improvising as the play’s characters way too successfully.
One of the most striking aspects of seeing this show at this present moment was how relevant it was to the stories in the news about Harvey Weinstein and other men in power taking advantage of women in subordinate roles. With all the discussion about the power dynamic between men running things and actresses especially, and all the awareness (and dumb jokes) about the ‘casting couch’, this play’s exploration of these issues felt extra timely. Thomas himself is in charge at first, displaying dominance over the uncouth (can anything be just couth) young actress who’s almost begging him for an audition. Then, Thomas’s characters in the play-within-the play, Keshemski and Vanda, display the same male-dominated relationship at times, especially at the end of their story. One of the questions is the extent to which Thomas’s characters reflect his own desires, and whether the resolution of his play is one that he approves, with a woman begging to be subordinated anew to the man she wants to call her master. It’s pretty misogynistic, and Vanda calls him out on that. Thomas refutes that it’s misogynistic since women do have power in the subordinate role, but despite his arguments seeming to have some truth as he tries to spin a psychological webs to defend himself, it’s pretty clear that he wrote what he knew, and he wrote what he wanted, and what he wanted looks an awful lot like misogyny.
The play is generally interesting and it holds your attention, but the last 15 or so minutes are really where it’s at. That’s when its drama and its revelations and the fear it instills are actually mesmerizing. The very end has a revelation that, like everything Vanda says, you don’t know if it’s true or not, but it sure seems like it could be despite the impossibility. It’s quite fascinating. And every success of this play relies on the actress playing Vanda, it was obvious. Natalie does a really impressive job, and while David kind of pales in comparison, his is a much less meaty role to work with. This is Vanda’s play. And though it’s a weird as ass play in general, the more I think about it the more I appreciate whatever the crap it was trying to do.
So do I regret still missing the Broadway production? I do, because while Dormer was great, the raves I heard about Arianda were unparalleled, calling it the best performance of that season and maybe beyond. I would have loved to have seen what she managed to accomplish with this crazy role in this crazy play. But I’m glad I saw this one, and while I still have no idea how to resolve the mysteries of the show in my head (not that I’m supposed to), I think it’s surely worth seeing. It’s awkward as ass watching it though so be warned and don’t go with…anyone. Well no don’t go alone that’s creeperish too (and I love going to the theatre alone but this would feel a little like you’re the man in a trench coat at an adult theatre). Go with someone you’d be comfortable watching “Eyes Wide Shut” with. Fun fact: an English teacher in high school made us watch parts of that. SUPER INAPPROPRIATE.
It begins in a New York loft on a stormy night, and there are claps of thunder and bolts of lightning. I thought that was a little unnecessary in the beginning but it totally works to accompany the f-ed up drama that gets going (and especially the twist ending). Thomas (Oakes), the playwright, is on the phone with his significant other, bemoaning (in a preeeetty okay American accent but you could tell it was forced and it made his voice tenor kind of annoying) that none of the actresses who auditioned for his new play were right. Enter Vanda (Dormer), carrying a broken wet umbrella and a HUGE duffel bag crammed full of who knows what and apologizing in a (very very terrible) New York accent for how late she is for her audition and that she was stuck on the subway and a guy was trying to harass her and she just talked and talked until Thomas was like, I don’t see your name, so she went on talking and talking complaining about her shitty agent and her shitty luck until he was like FINE audition just so you stop talking FFS! But the accent and the drawl and the nonstop talking continued as she offhandedly mentioned how she skimmed through the play on the subway and how it’s ‘totally S&M porn’. Thomas, the playwright, is aghast at such a statement, saying that the book it’s based on was high literature. Vanda points out that the book was written by the guy whose name is the root of ‘sado-masochism’ so it seems like she won that one. Between her horrendous accent and her sloppy attire and her nonstop unsophisticated talking, it’s clear that Thomas will never give her a chance to be in his play and that she probably is terrible anyway. She takes off her coat and under her clothes she is wearing a full leather and chain dominatrix outfit, which she explains because of the whole play-being-s&m-porn thing. He’s horrified and explains how the play takes place in like 18th century Germany or something like that between semi-aristocrats. Vanda excitedly rummages through her giant duffel and finds a cream-colored high-necked and full-skirted dress right out of the appropriate era and asks him to help her put it on.
Then she is finally about to read, and Thomas is obviously annoyed and eager to let her read a few lines then send her away. Vanda says she’ll try more of a continental accent, to which Thomas kind of scoffs, imagining it will be even worse than her regular voice. But then Dormer recites the lines in her regular perfect fancy English accent and it wouldn’t have been a surprise if Thomas dropped dead of shock. He, like the audience, was now riveted by this goddess who just a minute ago was this offensive slob. Throughout the whole first section, I was thinking ‘ohhh my god I can’t wait to complain about how they should have just had this based in London so these actors could speak in their regular accents and focus on the acting instead of these over-the-top New York fakings!’ Silly me, I had no idea how important the switching between the accents would be. And that kept repeating itself throughout this show – everything I questioned, every aspect I nitpicked, would prove to be a deliberate decision made to enhance the drama.
Throughout Vanda’s line reading, she would swiftly move in and out of her English to New York accents when she had commentary to make on the script. It was hysterical; she’d say something posh in her English voice and sit all poised and then without a beat say in the grating NYC voice ‘this is some bullshit right here Thomas’ or something like that. She kept breaking to mention how sexist this was and how a woman wouldn’t really act like that and whether this reflected Thomas’s own views and desires. As it progressed, it became clear that she had all of Vanda’s lines memorized. “I thought you said you skimmed through it once on the subway?” Thomas asked. Then Vanda’s commentary started to reference the original book the play was based on and parts of Greek & Roman mythology that inform the themes in that book. Thomas’s amazement and curiosity is echoed in the audience – how does she all of a sudden know everything about this topic and the literature behind it? Who is this person? And the answer to that question gets more and more unclear the more Vanda talks about herself and the more she develops her audition. Deeper into the play, Vanda seems to know an awful lot about Thomas and his personal life, and his significant other. But we have no idea whether any of the reasons she provides are true. And while we wonder along with Thomas about who this person is and how crazy or terrifying or dangerous she might prove to be, Vanda distracts everyone from that question by toying with Thomas with his own written words and then with her own, as they try improvising as the play’s characters way too successfully.
One of the most striking aspects of seeing this show at this present moment was how relevant it was to the stories in the news about Harvey Weinstein and other men in power taking advantage of women in subordinate roles. With all the discussion about the power dynamic between men running things and actresses especially, and all the awareness (and dumb jokes) about the ‘casting couch’, this play’s exploration of these issues felt extra timely. Thomas himself is in charge at first, displaying dominance over the uncouth (can anything be just couth) young actress who’s almost begging him for an audition. Then, Thomas’s characters in the play-within-the play, Keshemski and Vanda, display the same male-dominated relationship at times, especially at the end of their story. One of the questions is the extent to which Thomas’s characters reflect his own desires, and whether the resolution of his play is one that he approves, with a woman begging to be subordinated anew to the man she wants to call her master. It’s pretty misogynistic, and Vanda calls him out on that. Thomas refutes that it’s misogynistic since women do have power in the subordinate role, but despite his arguments seeming to have some truth as he tries to spin a psychological webs to defend himself, it’s pretty clear that he wrote what he knew, and he wrote what he wanted, and what he wanted looks an awful lot like misogyny.
The play is generally interesting and it holds your attention, but the last 15 or so minutes are really where it’s at. That’s when its drama and its revelations and the fear it instills are actually mesmerizing. The very end has a revelation that, like everything Vanda says, you don’t know if it’s true or not, but it sure seems like it could be despite the impossibility. It’s quite fascinating. And every success of this play relies on the actress playing Vanda, it was obvious. Natalie does a really impressive job, and while David kind of pales in comparison, his is a much less meaty role to work with. This is Vanda’s play. And though it’s a weird as ass play in general, the more I think about it the more I appreciate whatever the crap it was trying to do.
So do I regret still missing the Broadway production? I do, because while Dormer was great, the raves I heard about Arianda were unparalleled, calling it the best performance of that season and maybe beyond. I would have loved to have seen what she managed to accomplish with this crazy role in this crazy play. But I’m glad I saw this one, and while I still have no idea how to resolve the mysteries of the show in my head (not that I’m supposed to), I think it’s surely worth seeing. It’s awkward as ass watching it though so be warned and don’t go with…anyone. Well no don’t go alone that’s creeperish too (and I love going to the theatre alone but this would feel a little like you’re the man in a trench coat at an adult theatre). Go with someone you’d be comfortable watching “Eyes Wide Shut” with. Fun fact: an English teacher in high school made us watch parts of that. SUPER INAPPROPRIATE.
AUDIENCE
I didn’t see any phones! To continue the theme of sexism that this play presented, I’m going to say that’s because it’s usually men who I see on their phones during plays, but this one had Natalie Dormer half naked onstage the whole time, so they were preoccupied.
STAGE DOOR
Guys I tried! The Game of Thrones fandom is too much, I think! It was a huge line – seriously, a single file line down the sidewalk; they really need to figure out a better system because there’s no way the actors were going to walk down that line to sign programs. We waited about 20 minutes but then gave up. What do you say to actors after that kind of performance anyway??!! So awkward!
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“Honeymoon In Vegas” on Broadway is More Fun Than it Should Be
Obviously, they made a Broadway musical of the movie “Honeymoon In Vegas”, because the story of a nice but weak-willed man who loses a shittonne of money to a Vegas casino mogul who in turn requests a weekend with nice man’s fiancée who is a dead ringer for casino man’s dead wife instead of holding him to his losses just screeeeams Broadway musical. No, I’m actually not being sarcastic. This musical freaking works.
If you haven’t seen the movie “Honeymoon In Vegas”, with those celebrated dramatists Sarah Jessica Parker and Nicholas Cage, you really need to watch it right now. It’s one of those awful but amazing movies that is completely offensive when you think about it but if you choose not to think about it then it’s just super fun. Nicholas Cage plays a man who is haunted by his deceased overbearing mother who told him never to get married. His unlucky blonde girlfriend Betsy (Sarah Jessica Parker) obviously wants to get married because that is all women aspire to do in life, and also they are always blonde if they are worth all this fuss/treating as currency.
If you haven’t seen the movie “Honeymoon In Vegas”, with those celebrated dramatists Sarah Jessica Parker and Nicholas Cage, you really need to watch it right now. It’s one of those awful but amazing movies that is completely offensive when you think about it but if you choose not to think about it then it’s just super fun. Nicholas Cage plays a man who is haunted by his deceased overbearing mother who told him never to get married. His unlucky blonde girlfriend Betsy (Sarah Jessica Parker) obviously wants to get married because that is all women aspire to do in life, and also they are always blonde if they are worth all this fuss/treating as currency.
In the movie, James Caan plays the rich casino guy Tommy Korman, who conspires to trick Nicholas Cage out of lots of money in a fixed poker game, knowing he can’t pay, and says that he’ll forego the debt if he gets to borrow Betsy for a weekend. I mean, it’s pretty much the least feminist movie you can think of and yet I’m okay with it. Mostly because there are flying Elvises and because Nicholas Cage yells “Betsy!!!!!!” so well at the end.
Okay, so it’s on Broadway now with a score by my love Jason Robert Brown, in a serious detour from his past/serious/artistic stuff. You can tell he had fun with this one, relishing the opportunity to write hysterical, silly songs in a range of styles suitable for Vegas, from Sinatra-like crooning to Elvis-style rock to an actual number about straight flushes. The show stars the already great Rob McClure as Nicholas Cage, well as Jack Singer, and he is the biggest reason to see this show. I said already great because Rob has only recently become a recognizable name in the Broadway community, after his fabulous Tony-nominated performance in “Chaplin”. (He’s also widely considered the best guy to work with on shows, as no one beats his work ethic.) The producers are hoping that you want to see the show because Tommy Korman is played by Tony Danza, yes that Tony Danza, and no when I met him after and got a freaking picture with him and his arm was on my back I FORGOT TO SAY “Hold me closer Tony Danza” and I will never ever forgive myself for missing that opportunity of a lifetime.
Anyway, Rob as Jack is completely winning, and despite the character’s serious commitment phobia and other flaws, he successfully wins you over with the very first song. He’s in New York, and he sings about all the things in life he enjoys and likes, but how the thing he loves is Betsy. “I like taxis, I like trains, I like Brooklyn when it rains, but I love Betsy. I like walking after dark, I like jogs in Prospect Park, but I love Betsy.” It’s catchy as f@&$, unfortunately, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head for 3 weeks now. He’s so adorable in this song, and so necessarily charming, that he gains needed leeway in terms of your forgiveness for his actions to come. Comparing his girlfriend to all these activities and objects that he merely likes is also a great way to set the tone of the misogynist show to come, in a chipper way.
The high energy continues as Jack takes Betsy to Tiffany’s to finally propose, and in a fantastic little bit of theatre magic, one of the display cases turns in an instant to a hospital bed holding his dying mother, the ridiculously hilarious Nancy Opel, in a flashback to her death 10 years prior. She tells her son never to get married because no woman would ever love him like she does. It’s pretty absurd and amazing all at once, and it all just works.
Actually, side note, the most absurd and amazing part of the show was when the people sitting behind me – who I recognized from the rush line that morning, so they know at least a little about living – were talking and one girl said “What’s this about?” and the other said “Oh you never saw the movie? It’s like this really interesting drama that Woody Allen wrote and directed and you can tell it’s just sooo Woody Allen, you know?” I died. The movie is written by the guy who wrote “Fletch”, FFS. Not Woody Allen. My brother had tears. And he said loudly later “Yeah I love that they kept so many of Woody’s lines” and other things to mock these idiots. It was HILARIOUS. Also in line for the bathroom, these old ladies were talking about how “the girl in the Demi Moore part” was adorable and how “no one can beat Robert Redford, though.” Which is at least a tiny bit more forgivable because “Indecent Proposal” is just the slightly less funny version of the same exact movie, but still. How do people not know “Honeymoon In Vegas”?! It’s a Cage classic!
The pacing of this first act is so tight and really well done. Tony Danza as Tommy Korman is fantastic. He can’t really sing, and he is given WAY too many ballads that prove this, but he is pure charisma and he oozes that mobster-ish sleazy charm. He also gets a tap number that is actually really impressive.
My favorite Tony/Tommy song is pretty awful, in subject matter and black humor, but it’s so funny. When he first sees Betsy in his casino, he is shocked at her resemblance to his late wife. How did his wife die, you ask? Well, he sings about it. We move to a beach scene, and his wife is laying by the pool in the sun. Day after day after day. Tommy sings about how he should have made her get out of the sun. She died of skin cancer. It’s awful. But it’s so funny! Some people are saying how this song is really offensive and unfunny, but everyone in my packed audience thought it was hilarious. Also, it’s a good message?
Anyway, everything gets more ridiculous as Jack decides to go to a poker game Tommy invited him to, instead of rushing to marry Betsy as they came to Vegas to do. He says he’ll just be an hour, but obviously he stays much longer and she gets upset while shopping for her dress and all her shoes and stuff because she is a woman and just shops and shakes her head disapprovingly while she waits to get married. Brynn O’Malley is great in the role, really lovely and a strong singer, but she must have to do some serious readjusting of the brain pan after every show. I hope that she has a sign over the mirror in her dressing room that says “You are a worthwhile person and not just as currency!” or something like that.
So as the poker game goes on and on, this one song obviously called “The Game” goes on and on, and showgirls hold up enormous playing cards to show the men’s hands. It’s all just so ridiculous and yet so enjoyable. That’s the basic summary of this show. Anyway, they get to the part of the song when they sing “Straight flush!” and “Jack of diamonds, queen of diamonds, king of diamonds…” etc. as the notes get higher and higher. I really love that JRB wrote that. So Jack bets more money than he has and OMG I just realized why her name is Betsy, because she ends up standing in for his bets or something I wonder if the writers did that on purpose or if that’s just a really wonderful coincidence??? Yes so Jack loses $58,000 even thought he had a straight flush to the king, because Tommy had a straight flush to the ace. Yeah that is totally realistic and would ever possibly happen in a million years. No, we learn later Tommy obviously cheated.
Without the money to pay his losses, Jack is pretty forlorn and torn apart. Luckily! Tommy says heyyyy, how about we come to an agreement – this is the song called “An Agreement” – where I get to borrow your fiancée for the weekend? And Jack says absolutely not, that is disgusting and wrong! But Tommy has all that Terry Benedict charm and convinces Jack that it’s the only way to not lose Betsy, because if she found out how much money he lost, she would leave him anyway. So it’s worth a try!! No, it’s really not.
When Jack tells her what has happened, Betsy is obviously shocked and mortified and she refuses to be treated as currency, but then she gets reminded that she is a woman and that she only matters so far as the men say she does, so she agrees. I don’t know, it makes sense during the show but then when you think about it you are like whaaaaaaaaaaaaat. So she goes to Hawaii with Tommy, who like owns an island, and Jack is like what? You can’t take my fiancée to Hawaii! And Tommy’s people are like, well you only had parameters on the timeframe, not the location. Boom! Lawyered!
Jack realizes he was a total idiot and he flies to Hawaii to save Betsy from her lovely weekend with Tommy, who is nice but so sleazy. He even hired people to pretend to be his relatives so he would look good. And of course he lies about how much money Jack actually lost; when Betsy mentions the $58,000, Tommy says “Is that what he told you? He only lost $800!” or something horrendous that you’d assume Betsey wouldn’t believe, or that she’d at least be suspicious, but she is like drunk and really likes the pineapple in Hawaii so she believes him. Meanwhile, Jack tries to find Tommy’s house but Tommy pretty much owns everyone and everything on the island and he planned ahead to make sure everyone does their darnedest to keep Jack distracted if he followed them. The weakest part of the show is when the local Hawaiian, Mahi, yes that is her name, tries to seduce Jack in the jungle in a song called “Friki Friki.” I don’t know if I have ever cringed so hard during a song in a show. I wish they cut that. The rest of the audience seemed to like it though, somehow.
While Jack is being led all over tarnation by Tommy’s people, Tony Danza is inexplicably getting more and more ballads to sing and Betsy is getting drunker and madder at her spineless fiancé, so she agrees to marry Tommy. Okay monster man. They immediately fly back to Vegas. Jack finds out, and – in the most important scene of the movie and therefore of the play – hitches a ride back to Vegas with a troop of Flying Elvises, with his only option for landing being to skydive with them. It’s the best! I wish the show’s budget had had room for a more impressive skydive display, but then again it is happening on a stage, so it’s okay. The Elvises are a lot of fun, and Rob does his best Cage impression when he yells ‘BETSY!!!!’ and even though these Elvises are skydiving and landing who knows where in relation to the Las Vegas Strip, Betsy obviously hears him and runs up to him because we like things to be realistic. They reconcile and apologize and yada yada yada they get hitched and it’s all really happy and fun and that’s the show, folks. You really should see it.
Goodbye to The Good Place (Really Bestbye to the Best Place)
Hello, my little chili babies. It’s been almost a week since the 104% perfect finale of The Good Place, and I’m still crying so let’s talk it out. Although everything to say about it has already been said, it doesn’t feel right to not have something about it on my website for posterity. I mean I have a whole thing on the finale of How I Met Your Mother, which was super disappointing, so having that and not anything on the best TV show finale of all time would be point-losing nonsense. If you want to read my writing about my favorite show where I try to sound smart, click here to read my recent article for Tenderly Mag on Medium. If you’re cool with nonsense dribbled out in mostly recap form while I cried for the 1000th time in 5 days, then go ahead – whenever you’re ready. (Hot tip: You are only ready if you have watched every episode of the show.)
If you know me, or you watch television, or you have taste, you know that The Good Place is the best show ever. There isn’t one line that isn’t great, in four seasons. I mean I love lots of TV and have lots of favorites but man alive, even Friends has entire episodes I would cut. TGP was as tight as a drum, with every line, action, even every costume flawlessly committed to telling a coherent full story. I love everyone involved with this show for making it, from each writer (especially Megan Amram and her puns) to Marc Evan Jackson for the podcast (it’s so good and where I got a lot of the inside treats to come) to David Niednagel for the ridiculous special effects to Kirston Mann for the costumes (I agree about the stripes messaging, Marc) to Gay Perello for the amazing props (will never get over Jason’s first philosophy assignment, where he handwrote it and said “By Jason Mendoza, Age 27. Perfection). The cast is uniformly excellent, some of the best acting ever ever ever ever done. (“Acting is reacting. And reacting is pre-acting. And pre-acting, well that’s just being.”) And of course, creator Mike Schur, who might have a lot of annoying ideas about veganism, but he is a gd genius.
Since the pilot, anyone who tried to predict what would happen on this show has looked like a fool LIKE A FOOL. This most unpredictable show, lauded for how it solved in one episode or less what most programs would focus on for an entire season, always kept us on our toes. It felt appropriate that the finale would still be exciting and overwhelmingly emotional and brilliant but not entirely surprising, wrapping up everyone’s story, remarkably, in a way that was, only in hindsight, clear from the beginning. (“Is there a question?” “Don’t you think that’s remarkable?”) Even though the show was constantly surprising, they told us from the start what the end would hold for our heroes, if you paid attention. They each had to conquer their biggest flaws, and once they really and fully did, they would be ready to end this part of their existence. And often, doing so made them come full circle to the versions of themselves they pretended to be, whether on earth or in neighborhood 12358W.
I want to talk about each of my friends one by one.
Let’s start with Jason, since the episode does. After 2,242 Bearimys since we last saw him, Jason decides that his time in The Good Place has come to an end. At first I paraphrased Michael in the season 2 reboot montage and exclaimed, “Jason finds peace first? Jason?! Oh, this one hurts.” It’s no secret that Jason Mendoza (“that’s my boy right there!”) is my favorite character (well everyone is my favorite but I love that goofball so much). He is so dumb and sweet and surprisingly wise and so pure. The kids describe too many things nowadays as being ‘pure’ and it’s getting overused but really it is best used for Jason. I love that my boy is so pure so his is the shortest journey to finding inner peace. It makes sense that he would be the first of Team Cockroach to have that realization of tranquility in your soul that you are ready to be at one with the universe, or whatever you think happens when you walk through the door.
When Janet realizes what Jason needs to talk about, after he makes dinner for her the first time, that seems like the proper starting point for crying during this episode, but that assumes you haven’t been crying since the moment it began, or really since you started gearing up for it the week before. The moment that marked my transition from teary-eyed to heaving bawling was when they showed him playing Madden with Donkey Doug. Donkey Doug was the first new person we saw who had made it through the new system, and that, that broke me. Oh dip Donkey Doug! (“Oh dip…you’re Donkey Doug!” (that’s a deep cut of my favorite blooper ever from the blooper reel of season 3.)) The best thing about this show was on full display – its perfect blend of heavy moments and deep thoughts with ridiculous comedy. Like Jason’s comment that his goodbye party would play EDM all night and Eleanor saying “well now I’m bummed about two things.” My favorite Eleanor moment during Jason’s section was obviously the jalapeno poppers bit (“what is a jalapeno? Also what is a popper? Also what is jalapeno poppers?” will inexplicably forever be my most quoted line from this show): Jason explains that he knows this is his time, because he realized the air inside his lungs was the same as the air outside his body – the same sort of peaceful feeling as when you bite into a jalapeno popper you think will be too hot but then it’s actually the perfect temperature. Eleanor immediately confirms she knows that feeling, as she would, because she is fellow trash. I always loved their connection as two former trashbags with similar experiences, and I’m glad they had another such moment in the finale.
Through seemingly throwaway lines, the writers pack in so much information. When we see Doug Forcett overdoing it on fried chicken (Doug Forcett got in!!), Chidi says “good thing you chose your young body!” So we know that everyone we see from here on didn’t necessarily die at whatever age we see them; you get to pick what age you’ll spend eternity as. Noice. Smort. And when Pillboi (I cried so hard when we saw that Pillboi made it; I love him so much) in his toast that includes the phrase “Caspers the Ghost”, the best pluralization ever, says that Jason is his hero, it makes me believe that everyone who makes it to the Good Place learns about the people responsible for this new system. Thinking about how Doug and Pillboi know that Jason is responsible for saving every soul in the universe, and how Uzo knows that about Chidi, and how Donna knows that about Eleanor, and how Tahani’s parents know, it wrecks me.
But nothing wrecks me more than (well every minute of this finale) when Janet and Michael talk about being sad that Jason’s leaving, because FRIENDSHIP! THE REASON IS FRIENDSHIP! Ever since “Janet and Michael” in season 2, their relationship has been my favorite (they are all my favorite relationships but come on). It’s so special to watch the only two non-humans on Team Cockroach help each other grow during all these crazy experiences.
The most important part of Jason’s section (well, his first) is Janet explaining that she doesn’t experience time like humans do, and that she is living all times at once. We need to hear this so we’re not depressed at the thought of everyone eventually leaving Janet, thinking about how one day all her friends will be gone. For her, they aren’t. WE NEED THIS.
I was a little bummed that we said goodbye to Jason so quickly, but oh dip! We didn’t! The second half surprise that, since he lost the necklace he made for Janet, he looked for it (it was in the other pocket, obviously) and then waited until she came back to the forest – for thousands of years – was the best surprise. He passed all that time pretty chill, just letting his mind wander and thinking about the universe. LIKE A MONK. Jason, having started the show pretending to be Jianyu the monk, ending up monking it up harder than any monk ever has. That’s the kind of full circle Amy Sherman Palladino wishes she could write. So beautiful. Pretending to be Jianyu was torture for Jason, since he had to control his impulsivity, so his time in the forest proved that he had conquered all his worst traits and then some. He was complete, and he was ready.
But not before the greatest line ever on this show full of the best lines ever: Jason says goodbye again to Janet, and runs through the door shouting, “Chidi, wait up!” after Chidi had gone through (more on that soon). It’s so adorably dumb and perfectly Jason – he still sort of has no clue what’s going on, but it also shows how sweet and innocent he is and how much he cares about his friends: no matter what happened to his friend, or what form his essence is in, he’s coming to hang.
Fun facts:
- The passing yards Jason achieved in his perfect game of Madden totaled 12358.
- The actor playing Doug Forcett isn’t really an actor, he’s a comedy writer. So he didn’t know not to really eat all the food he was stuffing in his face take after take. He threw up after filming his scene.
- The subtitles have no idea what Pillboi says at the end of his toast: He calls Jason his ‘Gardner Minshew’, the footballer who replaced Nick Foles after he broke his clavicle (‘FOOOOOOOOOLES!’). This show taught me so much about literally every subject.
“It is I, Tahani.”
Next, 323.6 Bearimys later, Tahani has become an expert woodworker (and is wearing overalls, incredible), along with completing nearly 10,000 other afterlife goals she set. We need to look at her list:
- Land a triple axel (made me realize I would TOTES take up figure skating in the Good Place. You can’t break your head!)
- Solve the Poincare conjecture (lol NERD)
- Perform Il Dolce Suono from Lucia di Lammermoor at La Scala (is Tahani’s list my list?)
- Burp the alphabet (I CAN ALREADY DO THIS!)
- Become a master woodworker (okay it’s officially not my list)
- Learn how to repave a driveway (see above)
- Break Graham Gooch’s record of 456 runs in a single test (what are these words)
- Master conducting – orchestra (alright)
- Master conducting – train (lolol best joke for Z)
- Beat NBA Jam on all-star (??)
- Free Solo the Colossus of Rhodes (even when already dead I’d be too scared for this)
- Fix the Jesus fresco that lady messed up (this is the FUNNIEST FORKING THING EVER)
- Tahani al-Jamil’s ‘Borges’s “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote’”” (WTF DOES THIS MEAN)
- Make a vegan dessert that nobody suspects if vegan (ughhh Mikey my boy you still have a long way to go with your unfunny vegan jokes. This isn’t a hard thing to accomplish – if a food is bad, it’s not because it’s vegan, it’s because it’s bad. We’ve all had bad desserts and they weren’t bad due to the presence or lack of milk or eggs. They were bad because the person making it didn’t know what they were doing. Ughhh)
- Invent new musical instrument (I’d rather learn all the existing ones)
- Really nail the Lisa Left Eye Lopes rap from ‘Waterfalls’ (DONE)
- Finish Infinite Jest (NEVER)
- Spend one meaningful day with my parents [and she ending up having thousands! Ughh the best!]
- Defuse a bomb (YES)
- Fly a helicopter (NO)
- Perfect the backhand slice (DONE, BABIES)
When Janet tells Tahani, “the thing you wanted me to tell you when it happened? It happened”, I thought OMG IS IT KAMILLAH OR HER PARENTS, KAMILLAH OR HER PARENTS? The cut to her already being BFF with her sister and them living together (soulmates!) wrecked me so hard. Kamillah already made it and they have the relationship they always wanted. It was too much, and then you realize that that means the parents are coming. When her mother opened by shouting “My darlings!” oh my god if you didn’t gasp cry then you are dead inside. It was perfect, it was too much, it was beautiful. I keep thinking of that moment. It’s some of the best TV ever. How they built up that journey for this family, seeing how much they tortured Tahani, and then how she was responsible for them not being tortured forever but being redeemed so they could all enjoy what they missed out on, it might be the most emotionally meaningful argument for what they’re trying to say.
At Tahani’s goodbye party, she namedrops Frank Gehry (how many godparents does this b have!!) and we get a treat of seeing that John has made it as well, and as always he swans in and out faster than you can track and is at the ready with the funniest g-d line (“Alexander the Fine”) and gone before you catch your breath. He was such a great addition this season. Tahani realizes that she isn’t ready to leave through the door, but she wants to leave the Good Place – and train to be an afterlife architect, like Michael. This is my favorite. I love that not all the humans went through, and I love that Tahani is REALLY committing to helping people, and not just talking about it like she did on earth. On the podcast earlier this season, Jameela talked about how much she loved Tahani’s special growth and journey and we didn’t know what she was talking about until this great decision. Whereas Jason came full circle to how he started as Jianyu, Tahani finally became what she pretended to be on earth: someone who really and truly helps people, as well as an incredibly accomplished woman. She can literally do everything now, and she helped save humanity. (And she “snogged Ryan Gosling. Couple of times, actually.”)
I also loved that she trained all the animals, including the server panda. BUT QUESTION: Is this a magic panda that she trained to wait on her? Or did she train a regular panda to speak, serve, &c, and so she trained him to be magic? IF IT’S THE LATTER, and we know that Jeremy Bearimy works in mysterious ways, THEN MY BIG QUESTION IS GOING TO REMAIN IN ALL CAPS: IS THIS REGULAR PANDA THAT SHE TRAINED TO DO MAGICAL THINGS THE SAME MAGIC PANDA THAT JASON REFERENCES IN SEASON 2 THAT THEY SHOULD CAPTURE AND USE TO HELP THEM????!!!!!!!!! Did Tahani train the magic panda that then somehow was the panda that showed up two seasons ago??!! that’s some ‘Interstellar’ time shit right there.
Tahani and Michael go to the architects offices, and there we get a whole bunch of amazingness in a short time: Brett is on a TV screen in the hallway, being debriefed after another failed test. I like to think that his line of questioning shows he is really trying to think through his actions, and just still has a lot of work to do, but he will make it eventually. Then we see Glenn, my fave, who is super excited to have Tahani on his team! It’s so sweet! And craziest of all, Shawn is there, and although his face and tone still say evil, he’s…he’s pretty much not. It’s so forking good, as is his never-ending ‘ever, ever, ever’ delivery.
Fun facts:
- Nick Offerman (not Ron Swanson) makes it to the Good Place, which is fun (hope he learned in his tests to stop making stupid vegan jokes), but not as fun as knowing that the chair he’s praising, that Tahani has crafted, he actually despised in real life. They couldn’t get the $50,000 chair Nick suggested they get for this scene (wonder why) and he said that the chair they chose was so poorly made that his woodworking friends were going to make fun of him for praising it on TV.
- The al Jamils watch ‘Home Alone’ together on movie night, the movie Tahani was afraid of when Jason first showed her, but now she’s not afraid of her family abandoning her. (“you hear that? I’m not afraid anymore!”)
- Kamillah was painting waves.
- When Michael and Tahani go into the hub where the Doorman sits (now so much livelier and busier due to all the happenings in the universe, I love it), you can see (mostly hear) Trevor screaming as he flies across the space. In season 3, the judge pinged him off the bridge, and he has been pinging around every since. I CANNOT WITH THIS SHOW.
- Michael’s gift to Tahani on her first day as an intern is the peacock bowtie he wore in the pilot.
Chidi Annakendrick time.
When the screen showed that another 661.7 Bearimys had past, I started hyperventilating knowing that this was going to be the Eleanor and Chidi section. We start with the two nerd lovers reading, Eleanor finally finishing Scanlon’s What We Owe to Each Other (the book she ripped to write the ‘Eleanor – Find Chidi’ note), and Chidi reading The Da Vinci Code, calling it a garbage book. Our favorite pair still seems as happy together as ever, despite thousands and thousands of Bearimys spent together, but Chidi you can tell is weary. They have another fun dinner with their friends – Simone, who I sobbed seeing, along with Eleanor’s old roommates (the dress bitch made it in!), which also made me sob, and UZO, my favorite! I’m vexed, Uzo, truly vexed! Having this group of people together is the best part; this is what the Good Place should be all about. I love that Eleanor’s old friends haven’t had their personalities changed – they are still trash who want a karaoke bar that’s also a tanning salon, so the harder you go at the song the tanner you get (incred) – but they are better people now. It shows that the system really works. You don’t have to be boring or flat to get in; you can be yourself as long as you’re a decent person.
Anyway this group made me so happy and so cry. But when Eleanor says how fun it was, Chidi says yeah, it’s always fun, all the hundreds or thousands of times they’ve gone out with this group. We also learn that Donna and Chidi’s parents have made it in and have met many times. Chidi recounts these facts in a tired manner – everything he ever wanted, he got long ago. Chidi is ready to go, you know right away, and so does Eleanor. Oh my god, the sobbing. How does one leave the other?
I’m so glad I forgot that people saw the show filming in Europe last year, so I got to enjoy the surprise Athens and Paris emergency getaways as intended. This was an incredible section, not just for the views of the acrompolympse (this is how I pronounce it so I may as well be honest in my writing it) but for focusing solely on Eleanor and Chidi’s story. They deserved it after all they’ve been through. They got to go up the acrompolympse before it opened to the public one morning, and the local Greek crew was so emotional that it makes me emotional to think about. I went once and it was packed to the gills with sweaty tourists, so this is nice.
People always point to “Janets” as evidence of how good D’Arcy Carden is (rightly so), but her best performance for me might be the subtle faces she makes during this section. You can see on her face that she is going to help Eleanor, but she knows it’s wrong. If Chidi is ready, then you need to let him go. She does say this eventually, but her face said it first, and continues to show her disagreement with Eleanor while continuing to help.
After Athens, Janet zipped them to Paris, where the weather was indeed perfect for Paris: overcast and chilly. The cut right to Sacre Coeur made me cry too even though my only really strong memory from all my visits is hilarious (my cousin and I tried to buy Invicta backpacks off of Italian tourists on these steps, eventually successfully, and we met a man who kept saying “yes yes I write many books!”). We knew Chidi had lived in Paris, and when he walked to his old apartment, you could feel him saying goodbye to everything he did in his life. Eleanor finally admits to him that she knew he wanted to leave and didn’t want him to because she was always abandoned and alone on earth, and it is heartbreaking. She’s overcome so many of her terrible traits but she’s still scared of being alone forever. But the biggest problem she overcame is her selfishness, and so she quickly realizes that the last selfless act she has to do is let him go. She says she owes it to him to let him go, calling back to Scanlon (and the whole message of the show, really). THIS SHOW IS PERFECT.
If you weren’t crying the entire time already, this really started the unending cry wave. Chidi’s goodbye party was done silently, with just that music that was too much playing, so it was a punch in the gut. It was so well done, so perfect, and so sad. And then it got worse (/better), when Chidi talked about the wave returning to the ocean and hot goddamn, this is the most beautiful idea ever. I’m not going to copy it here because it will cheapen it, but it shares an incredible idea, and the perfect Eleanor and Chidi ending, along with his beefcake calendar. Ugh my heart. With Chidi’s final exit, his journey was perfectly completed, since unlike everyone else, he didn’t need to sit on the bench till he was ready. He was ready, and he strode right through – the biggest decision in the entire universe, he made easily. He was complete.
Fun facts:
- It took Eleanor 2000 Bearimys to finish Scanlon’s book, a joke Schur included because he still hasn’t finished it.
- We learn that Tommy Quine Quine made it in, along with the show’s real philosophy advisors, Professors Todd May and Pamela Hieronymi (seen in Chidi’s class).
- A few episodes ago in the judge’s chambers, Chidi asked for some warm pretzels, because if he was going out, he was going out with a belly full of warm pretzels. In Athens, Eleanor and Chidi walk down the street eating koulouri, a typical snack that is sooort of like a soft pretzel! He’s going out with a belly full of sort-of soft pretzels.
- Eleanor and Chidi are the first people to be together for thousands and thousands of years and still use the terms girlfriend and boyfriend.
- The music played over Chidi’s party is the incredible Spiegel im Spiegl by Avro Part. It broke me.
- Someone translated the calendar that Chidi gave Eleanor, and two of the big chunks of text are lyrics to “The Power of Love”. There’s also a day called Monday2.
Eleanor and Michael
My favorite trashbag and the best demon in the world had the most unbelievable journeys. Michael went from an evil demon wanting to torture humans in a new fun way to helping save all of humanity and truly loving humans more than anything. Eleanor went from a mean loner who was Arizona shrimp horny to saving humanity with her best friends. Her ethical journey, shown from the layman’s perspective, helped simplify the immense concepts of the show, making all the lofty goals palatable and natural. When you think about how much she sucked on earth, it really shows how strong and how smart this new system is, how much it could help nearly everybody and how even people who suck may be worthy of redemption. Eleanor was not a good person before, and now she is our hero.
However, she’s not ready to move on, despite years now without Chidi, even though she wants to be ready. Letting him go was one of her most selfless acts, showing how much she’s grown. But she needs to keep helping the people close to her who remain, so she can be sure she did everything she could to make them happy. First, that means a return to my favorite person in the entire world, Mindy St. Clair. Mindy stayed in the Medium Place this entire forking time, rebooting Derek so many times that now he is, I don’t even know what he is, an all-powerful being that is at once a singular point in space but also contains space itself, whose moment of creation is now the same as the inevitable heat death of the universe. So yeah, he sounds super annoying. Niednagel outdid himself on this new Derek form, with the swirling martini glasses that also have Dereks in them, and those Dereks also have martini glasses. It’s INCREDIBLE.
Mindy is still crabby and blasé about her existence. It makes a kind of poignant, lovely sense that she is the worst case version of Eleanor, if Eleanor continued to always be alone, and that’s why Eleanor needs to help her. It makes me cry all over again thinking about how all their stories connect. Mindy doesn’t want just anyone in charge of her if she decides to go through the system so she can go to the Good Place – but now Tahani is an architect (with the best line, “Mindy St. Clair as I neither live nor breathe”) who could handle her case. It’s beautiful, as is Mindy’s thank you to Eleanor about how she never gave a crap about herself, so it’s nice that Eleanor gave a crap about her. Of course her capper is the hysterical line “I’m really glad I filmed you having sex”. Typical Mindy.
But ensuring Mindy’s eventual salvation isn’t enough. The most important player in this whole epic is still left: Michael. The reveal of what Eleanor realizes she needs to do for Michael is magically done, starting with Maya Rudolph smacking her desk and shouting “COCKAMAMIE” as no one else could. I was in the middle of thinking ‘that was one of the best moments ever’ but then it cut to the one that rips your heart out: Eleanor saying, “Michael, come on in.” That mirroring of his famous first line, plus the mirroring of Eleanor’s 1.13 speech (“it took me a while to figure it out” &c.) absolutely slayed me. That is incredible writing. Michael becoming a real boy, Pinocchio, is of course where his story has been heading the entire time; I just never guessed. Eleanor and Janet warn him that life will be hard (“you have blood now!”) and that they don’t know if the system will still be the same when he dies, and he says “that’s what makes it special. I won’t exactly know what will happen after I die. Nothing more human than that.” That’s it man, that’s the whole thing. Oh man Ted Danson is THE BEST.
The waterworks continue courtesy of the Doorman finally getting a real frog and from another big Janet Moment. She was never sad about the others, because she knew they were ready to be at peace with the universe (and she lives all times at once so won’t be lonely (I’m really holding fast to that)). But with Michael going to earth, she’s really sad, because she will be worried about him the entire time and unable to help him. I love them.
The shots of Michael’s life on earth are hilarious – he does everything he wanted to do as a human, including take guitar lessons. He has a big oafy dog named Jason, with a Jaguars bowtie (of course he named the dog Jason, Jason is a puppy). And you may have noticed he lived in apartment 322 (the number of residents in his neighborhood) at 12358 Blatta Vista (the number of his neighborhood, and Blatta means cockroach. Team Cockroach for life). I don’t think I ever cried as hard as I did during the last five minutes, when Eleanor and Janet say goodbye, when Eleanor walks through the door, and when we finally see what happens. It’s just vague enough that everyone can decide for themselves what they want to believe. All the existing little firefly lights, the essences of people who have walked through the door, are joined by Eleanor’s lights, and they float to earth and inspire humans to be just a little better. I honestly still can’t believe what one of her little lights brought about on earth, to Michael Realman, the stupidest best name. This ending is so gorgeous and so perfect. I’m blown away by what they accomplished. Our humans worked so hard to become better people and they forever inspire others to do the same, regardless of their own form of existence. Some people don’t understand the point of the door, saying that if they had eternity in the Good Place they’d enjoy it forever. Well, bully for you. I get it though. As Chidi says in his philosophy class, “mortality offers meaning to our lives” (“and morality helps navigate that meaning”, the point of the show). All good things need to come to an end eventually, otherwise they wouldn’t be good. I feel that, my little chili babies. Hot diggity dog this was the best forking show ever.
Okay that’s enough crying. Take it sleazy.
