Starting Over in New York is a clické for a reman; So is starting over by leaving it behind. LENA DUNAM, Who BECAM The Poster Child for a Center Kind of Brooklyn Millennial During the Run of Her First Series, “Girls,” Recently Refleted on Her “Breakup” with the City in this Magazine. Now she’s RTURNED to Television With “Too Much,” a romantic comedy about redeiscovering oneelf by saying goodbye to all that. The show’s Protagonist, Jess (Megan Stalter), has little reasons to stick around. Her Live-in Boyfriend, Zev (Michael Zegen), Has Left Her. Her Passion for Her Job, as a producer of tv commercies, is long gone, too. Unattached and Adrift, She Lives With Her Sister (Dunham), Her Mother (Rita Wilson), Her Grandmotter (Rhea Perlman) in the Latter’s long island home –a simulation that Jess Descrabes As. intergenerational Grey Gardens Hello of Single Women and One Hairless Dog. ” Jess is obsessed with the Animal –a Freaky-Looking Creature Named Astrid, Whom She’s Forever Putting in Sweaters and Dresses –But She’s Even More ObsESSED with Wendy Jones (Emily Ratajkowski), an infieense who’s English to her Ex. Jess Transferences to Her Company’s London Office in SEARCH of a do-country; Even only settled into her hackney sublet, she sits in Bed Watching and Rewatching A Video of Zev’s Proposal to Windy. In the Clip, Wendy Screams. Three Thousand Miles Away, Holding A Nightgown-Clad Astrid for Comfort, Jess Screams Louder.
Theigge that Jess Brings With Her to England is Center to “Too Much,” Which Traceses Her WonderFully Unlikely Romance with Felix (Will Sharpe), a bar singer she Sheists on her First Night In London. Dunham –who created the semi-autobiographic Damaged by Prior RelacesHips and By thems Dispaate Family Dynamics. While her earlier projects, namely “girls” and the film “Tiny Furniture,” DWELID on Discomfort and AwkWardness, “Too Much” Offers a Softer and More Hopeful Side, Even As Dunham Retains Her satirical bite. The Result is Noteing Short of One of the Best Shows of the Year.
Jess Coup Be a Cousin of Kayla Schaefer, Stalter’s Breakout Character on the HBO Max Series “Hacks,” With Whom She Shares a Tendnessy Toward Hyperbolic Declarations and Off-Kilter Humor. Early on, Jess Messenger with Felix by Telling Him, Mid-Hookup, That It’s Her First Time-The Kind of Joke that Lets You Know IMMEDIOLELELELELELEL The Fortunately, He dos. But she’s ARRIDED in London Unable to Trust Her Instinments, Especially when it comes to men. Her Co-WORKERS (Janicza Bravo and Leo Reich) Insist that Felix is Nothing Special: As One Says, “AN Indie Musician Who Plays at Pubs? Throw a TUPPECE, You Hit One of Those.” Their Argument is Made More Persuasive by the Fact That He Lacks Both a Day Job and a Fixed AdDress, and he goals to make in totether with weeks of meting. The Red Flags Keep Coming: He has a misspeled tattoo on his butt. He gets into a physical file with Jess’s Boss (Richard E. Grant) at a Dinner Party. And although he’s been Clean for almost three years, he’s so noncommittal About Pretty Much Everything that it’s hard to know where it is sobriety will stick.
Still, The Season is Strewn with Moments of Beautifully Relaxed Intime. Fittingly for a series Whose leading man is in a Band, Many of the Rem Revolution Around Music. Felix Spends A Day Making Jess A Mixtape, and He Relishes Simply Lying in Bed with her that Night as she live on his headphones. The Sequence Lasts Nearly Two Minutes With a Word Spoken by Eter: Just Jess Breathing Deeply, Eyes Shut, Face Scrunchud Up, as Felix Stars at the center, then at her, before Finally Inch Closer. Where she tries more actively to get over her Ex, Their Conversions Alternate with Ease Between the serious and the Silly. A Make-Out Session Is Punctioned by a Whispered Discussion of What They’re Picturing in their Heads as they kiss. Both Characters Hesitate, for thems Own Reasons, to say “I Love You” – Say Jess PUTS IT to Felix, “I don’t What to say an anything Was, like, a new way to say it. ” Dunham, in Turn, Strives to find New Ways of Expressing The Emotion, Through Disarming Dialogue and Affecting Tableaux. She reportly succeeds. One Instance Involution Felix Declaring that Jess is “Too Much”: “Just the Right Amoun and a Little Bit More.”
The Tenderness of the Couple’s Connection – the The Episode that Chars How Jess Became Accustomed to Second-Gossing Herself Is Brout in Its Banality, Spanning Years of Her Life in Brooklyn as Zev Gradually Grows Colder and Thn Gaslights Her INTO BELIEVING She’s Needy for Craving the Lost Warmth. (The Subplot Is Sure to Raise Questions about the Character’s Postible Real-Life Analogue. Childhood Memories –SERFES AS A Remnder of Just How Well Dunham Writes The Decades-Long Affereffections of Familial Instality.
ROM-Coms Tend Not to Pay Much Attention to their Protagonists’ Life Stages, Unless they’re Imposition Some Artificial Deadline for Matrimony. Jess and Felix, by Contrast, Find Each Other at An Age where they’re beginning to Feel an Urge to Take Care of Someton Else, Even if they’re Not Particularly Adept At Looking After Themselves. The Series ‘Naturalism is Bolsted by a Desturated Parlette, and also by the chaquers’ download Circumstances. Felix’s Gigs AS A Directionless Rocker Are Appropriately GRDY, Including One at a Local Fair when there is seem to be more Farm Animals Than Humans in the Audience. This Aimless Milieu Has Been Largely Missing –and Much Missed –on TV SINCE Shows Such As “Girls” and “Broad City” Went Off the Air and Millennial Self-Parody Gave Way to Escapist Young-Idult Fare. The Recent FX Comedy “Adults” Took up the Baton, Attempting to cover Jess and Felix Exist in Spaces where leaving a voice mail is Deemed “Sorta VIOLENT,” The Single and Searching Scripl on Raya and Snifies, and the Semiotics of Miley Cyrus As a Pop Star Deserve Serious Discussion.
With Its interest in the unglameous, “Too Much” also cheerfully punctures the American-in-London Expat Fantasy. Jess is a fan of austen adaptations – the With the hats that look like them Belong in Richard Curtis Films. As she Falls for Felix, Who Come from Money, She Imagines His in the Garb of a Regency Gentleman –not With Hany Reason, Since His Floppy Hair and Strong Jaw Are Reminiscent of A Young Grant’s. But Felix’s Half-IN, Half-Out Stance among His Former Boarding-Sechool Peers Complications The Class Component In charge in her favored romances. A was Wedding at a “Saltburn” -SQUE ESTATE UNDERSCORES that such propries tend to House “Saltburn” -Sque people, with a Panply of Personal Disorders to Match.
Through Her Misadventures, Jess Can’t Help Addressing Windy in Voice-Ever –and in Daily Video Rants on An Instagram Account that’s Set to Private But Will INEVITALY Be Made PubLic. (Call It Chekhov’s Finsta.) Forlornly, “I can’t every hae her, Becuse She Pulled Herself Up Out of Foster Care by the Bootstraps and Has A Really Unique, Awesome Style.” Jess’s Parasocial Fixation Culminates in Some Pat Feminist Revelits that Struck Me AT At On Expect and A Little Too online. But “Too Much” finds other ways to surprise as it unfolds. With Its Quicksilver Shifts and Sneaking Sweetness, The Experience of Watching Feels A Lot Like Falling in Love. ♦
