Slings & Arrows - Season 2

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Starring: Stephen Ouimette
Rated: NR (Not Rated)
Type: DVD
Directed By: Peter Wellington
Studio: Acorn Media
Release Date: 2006-10-24
Running Time: 282 minutes
Number of Items: 2
"Absolutely addictive" —The New York Times
"One of television’s best" —San Francisco Chronicle
"Struts and frets . . . delightfully" —Time

In its second season, the smash hit Canadian comedy about a struggling Shakespearean theatre troupe explores the conflicts of middle age and rebranding: Am I who I want to be—or not to be?

Now ensconced as artistic director of the New Burbage theatre festival, Geoffrey (Paul Gross) must stage the cursed play Macbeth to fulfill the vision of his deceased predecessor Oliver (Stephen Ouimette). The actor cast in the lead (Geraint Wyn Davies) engages in a titanic clash of egos with Geoffrey, while Oliver weighs in confrontationally from the grave. The festival faces a financial crisis that forces its CEO (Mark McKinney) to engage in some risky business, while leading lady Ellen (Martha Burns) endures a life-altering tax audit. Adding to the mayhem is the return of the madcap guest director Darren Nichols (Don McKellar), who stages a post post-modern Romeo and Juliet after the original director breaks her neck. Could it be the curse of Macbeth?

As seen on the Sundance Channel.

Loved it. Absolutely brilliant.
This is a wonderful TV show -- intelligently written, funny, complex and superbly acted. Perfect for theatre lovers, fans of good drama or tart comedy, and anyone looking for TV shows that elevate the medium and have real substance. And, god, Paul Gross is a marvelous actor!!

Just for reference, other favorite shows of mine include "Freaks & Geeks," "My So-Called Life," "Six Feet Under," "Rome," "West Wing" "Buffy," "Prime Suspect" and a few others... This one easily rises towards the top of the list. Highly recommended. (Joe Sixpack, Slipcue)

Tax Time
Season Two tells us first of all what happens with Rachel McAdams, whose adorable ingenue of Season One has finally gotten the chance to play Juliet--the dream of every young actress. But will she have to give up her dream because of her love affair with a handsome and talented young action star of Hollywood movies?

Oddly enough it's like having a second "sixth episode" to Season One, and thus most of the second series is crammed into five episodes. Geoffrey is now fulfilling Oliver's dream of directing Macbeth, and there's a curse on it called Henry Breedlove, apparently Canada's most acclaimed actor but a horror to work with, vain and capricious and totally up his own fundament. Geoffrey however has a few tricks up his sleeve to get the sort of performance he needs from this ham of hams.

A secondary story has the wonderful Darren Nichols come back to direct the New Burbage Festival's Romeo and Juliet. This story is spoiled somewhat by the inadequate actors SLINGS found to play Sarah and Patrick, but their situation (he's gay, she's straight, but such is the power of the poetry that they fall in love with each other) is so inanely written that Lunt and Fontanne couldn't have saved it. It's just a terrible comedown from the sublime McAdams-Luke Kirby chemistry of Season One.

Happily the worthy Martha Burns gets the plot of a lifetime, as Ellen Fanshawe is hauled into Canadian tax court, for an audit that is strikingly like modern-day Freudian therapy. Ellen is forced to confront all of her demons, including her cheapness and her flair for self exaggeration. It is a devastating demonstration of Burns' genius as an actress unafraid to expose the most sordid bits of her soul and body, while the lucky bit player opposite her, as the tax examiner who secretly loves Shakespeare, matches her point by point.

Delightful, heartbreaking, must-see
Substance is outstanding: witty, sad, excellent performances all around. Dense enough to bear repeated viewing: I bought the full set after watching it via rental.

OK image & 2 ch sound marred by non-verbatim closed captions.

Features are weak (and not captioned). Bloopers barely generate a smile. I sorely miss any writers/producers/directors commentary track.

outrageous fortune
This series took me several episodes to adjust to its quirky solution of ridiculous comedy and intense drama. Once I was in though, i was in for the long haul. If you are a theater person, you will LOVE it. If you aren't a theater person, you may be surprised to LOVE it anyway and perhaps discover why the stage is such a passion for so many. The inner workings of a non-profit theater festival, though greatly simplified in this series, is hilariously accurate as artistic and corporate interests tangle horns. Some of the characters are unforgettable. The comedy is at its best when subtle and the writing gets better and better as the seasons progress.
Highly recommended.

Macbeth Proves Worthy
Incredibly, spectacularly, this, the second season, is even better than the incomparable first season. What in the end sets this show apart is the uniformly superb acting. We thought, perhaps, that the first season's ensemble was thrown together by chance but, no, there are geniuses at work here. As a result, we have that rarest of rarities, the perfect second season. No doubt, Canadians have come to expect this kind of thing, namely, wit, intelligence, grace, and subtlety, but here in the States, these features left television long ago. Our shows about thugs and killers have, it must be said, grown more sophisticated, but our comedies have fallen to the lowest possible level, besides possessing the fatalist of all flaws: they are not in the least funny. In "Slings and Arrows" there are all sorts of wonderful features: witty dialog, satire, romance, intellectual content, drama... It's really too much. I am totally addicted to this show and already dread the day when I must say I have seen the entire series.