Acting (belatedly) on Tim Goodman’s recommendation (spoilers there), we finally Netflixed the first three episodes of Slings and Arrows, a Canadian comic drama about a Shakespearean troupe (the “New Burbage Shakespeare Festival”) in turmoil. In the course of staging a production of Hamlet, they contend with the death of an indispensible character; an artistic director who was once driven mad by the play; a chirpily sinister corporate sponsor; long-festering hatreds among the principals; a clueless Gringolandian movie star; and much more.
As befits theatrical folk, everything is exaggerated and outrageous, and nobody is ever without an audience (if only in their own minds). It’s a world of outsized egos, petty jealousy, backbiting, and pretentious poses. In the middle of a rapier duel at a party (yes, there is a duel with rapiers–buttons off), the stage manager snaps at the assembled actors that they’re all a lot of insufferable children–and of course she’s right; but they’re immensely entertaining children, and their childlike love of theatre is the thing that redeems them.
It is exaggerated and at the same time nuanced. Lurking amid the manic farce are serious questions (about the relationship between art and commerce; about the purpose of live theatre in a world glutted on entertainment) and a pervasive sadness (at aging; at lost love, and long-ago betrayals; at becoming less than they had hoped; at the sense of their own obsolescence). The drama is never forced or heavy-handed, but simply human, inseparable from the comedy as it is in real life.
The cast is excellent, mostly not-quite-recognizable actors who I suspect are much better known in Canada (Paul Gross, from Tales of the City, Mark McKinney, from Kids in the Hall, and Rachel McAdams, from Mean Girls are the three I knew). The screenplay is consistently witty, and by ‘witty’ I mean ‘laugh-out-loud hilarious’. As in, you often have to rewind to get the funny line you missed when you were laughing at the funny line before it.
Highly recommended. Put it in your queue now.
