Private Faces: notes on Roadkill and Life

Collateral was my favorite TV drama of 2018. With only two months remaining, I’d be surprised if Roadkill doesn’t wind up my favorite drama of 2020. Both were written by David Hare, and in tone and construction, they couldn’t be less alike. Essentially the only thing they have in common is that both are masterful. So basically, what we have here is a 73-year-old playwright and screenwriter at the peak of his powers, which, offhand, might just be the most encouraging thing I can say about 2020.

Newhart season 7

Of the sitcoms I’ve profiled at this blog, some emerged out of the gate fully formed (Murphy Brown, Bewitched). Others took a while to get their bearings: to figure out how to most successfully showcase the characters and mine the comedy. And that’s not that unusual. A whole lot of promising sitcoms don’t catch fire till Season 2; the first season is a bit of a learning curve for the writers, and come Season 2— if the show is filmed before a live audience — you get to share in the audience’s exhilaration, when it’s apparent to all that the show has been (sometimes only subtly, but nonetheless momentously) transformed, and the laughs have blissfully multiplied. And then there are the shows that don’t reach maturity till a little later. Both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Designing Women become the best versions of themselves in Season 3: the former through a soft reboot, the latter through a careful rebalancing act.

But how about a sitcom that becomes the very best version of itself in Season 7?

Doctor Who: in praise of "The Smugglers"

The second of three lost Doctor Who serials that don’t get nearly enough praise or attention. To check out the first, “The Abominable Snowmen,” click here.

There’s only one reasonable response to “The Smugglers” — and its tale of 17-century piracy — and that’s unconditional surrender.

And still it’s the single most overlooked serial in all of Classic Who.