Comedy and cast light up 'Weeds'

Comedy and cast light up 'Weeds'

By Gary Strauss, USA TODAY



When it comes to dysfunctional TV families, Showtime's Weeds sets a high bar.

In more ways than one.

IN THE 'WEEDS': Pick up where Season 2 left off

Showtime's unconventional dark comedy about widowed soccer mom Nancy Botwin (Mary-Louise Parker) selling marijuana to make ends meet begins its 15-episode third season Monday (10 ET/PT). But marijuana is merely an entry point for a satirical exposé that strips the facade off suburban cookie-cutter conformity.

"Most families, organic or the ones you create with friends and co-workers, are flawed and messy," says Weeds creator and executive producer Jenji Kohan. "A lot of comedy comes from that."

Many comedies fall short trying to mine family dysfunction for laughs. But Weeds' cast and story lines, which touch upon drug use, race, politics and social mores with subtle wit to slapstick humor, have made the show a critical favorite. In two seasons, Weeds and its cast have received 14 Golden Globe and Emmy nominations.

The premise and pilot script drew name actors such as Parker — an in-demand Emmy, Tony and Golden Globe winner — Elizabeth Perkins, former Saturday Night Live cast member Kevin Nealon and Justin Kirk (Angels in America), who as Botwin's brother-in-law Andy is the most hyperkinetic and energized small-screen character since Entourage's Ari Gold.

Parker relishes her role. "She's damaged, which are the most interesting to play. But she's well intentioned and trying to do the best she can." Parker enjoys how all of the characters interact. "I love their perversity and their relationships. There are so many little stories from different worlds."

Romany Malco's comedic turn in The 40-Year-Old Virgin brought ample offers for narrowly drawn, stereotypical African-American roles. He spurned most offers until Weeds. His character, Conrad Shepard, is Botwin's multilayered horticulturalist, consigliere and potential love interest.

"You got a black man selling drugs. But he's cerebral and subtle, not the reactionary guy you're accustomed to seeing," Malco says.

He also was drawn by Weeds' exploration of family. "The thing that appealed to me is how vulnerable everyone is. The protective veneer is stripped away."

Kohan, a veteran producer and writer who wanted to do a show about an outlaw, says Weeds' pot-selling-mom premise was a novel but relatable concept. With government estimates that 96 million Americans have tried pot, Weeds "crosses all social, ethnic, political and economic lines."

Kohan insists Weeds "isn't a soapbox" for marijuana. But writers get topical on pot and other topics, often with timely, charged zingers. A stoned character rants about a businessman who "overcharges like Halliburton." Another lambastes the Iraq war. A sixth-grader complains, "Bush is the worst president ever."

Despite the awards and critical praise, Weeds has a tiny but growing audience. While viewership jumped 20% last season, the average weekly audience was just 1.9 million. With Showtime in only 14 million homes, it's unlikely Weeds will become a mainstream hit. (To spur interest, Showtime marketers persuaded the 43-year-old Parker to pose nude for this season's promotional ads, a snake draped seductively over her shoulder. "The snake was real," she says.)

Word-of-mouth praise has planted Weeds on the cultural radar and helped sprout a fan base on other platforms. It's among the top TV shows downloaded on Apple's iTunes. Sales of the just-released Season 2 DVD rank 11th out of 400 TV-to-DVD sets released so far this year, according to tracker Nielsen First Alert. And the show has been sold to 120 foreign markets, a fat number for a decidedly outside-the-box American comedy, says Ken Beggs, president of TV programming at studio Lionsgate.

One toke over the line

The show's pot-centric theme hasn't drawn much ire outside of anti-drug advocacy groups, says Showtime entertainment chief Robert Greenblatt, who greenlit the series to energize and burnish the premium cable channel's original programming slate.

Marijuana advocates cite the authenticity of the behind-the-scenes pot economics, augmented, Kohan says, by consultation with actual growers and dealers.

"Weeds is incredibly accurate, and the writing is topical," says Allen St. Pierre, director for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML).

Bong hits aside, the show's popularity centers on Parker's nuanced turn as a semi-desperate housewife from the fictional upper-middle-class burg of Agrestic. She's evolved from small-time dealer to large-scale entrepreneur.

Numbed by her husband's fatal heart attack, she struggles to keep her two sons focused as they deal with a fatherless household, school and ripening sexuality. (Sixth-grader Shane experienced the pleasures of early puberty at a massage parlor last season, while high schooler Silas intentionally impregnated his Princeton-bound girlfriend.)

"Dysfunction seems to be a focal point in comedies about family," says Parker, noting that when it comes to relationships, normality is atypical. "I don't know any normal families. If you lift up the rock, there's usually some weird stuff crawling around."

Perkins' caustic, self-absorbed Celia Hodes is even more dysfunctional. She boozed her way through a failed marriage, a double mastectomy, two affairs and an ouster from her home by her emasculated husband (Andy Milder).

"Weeds seems outrageous, but it's heightened reality, and there's so much humor in that," says Perkins, whose character is trying to reconcile with ostracized preteen daughter Isabelle (Allie Grant), whom Celia harps on for being chubby.

Kirk's Andy Botwin has a broader comedic presence. Andy has been living off the grid in Alaska to avoid his army obligations, which he has tried to scuttle, first by finagling his way into rabbinical school and later by feigning disability after two toes were bitten off by a bulldog.

At first glance, he's a prototypical slacker, but Andy is layered with savvy and sex appeal.

"All of the characters are well drawn. You want to see them and their stories," Kirk says. "What makes Weeds truly unique is how it veers between broad comedy and drama. Most shows do one or the other. The magic of Weeds is that it makes both work."

Family values

The interactions between Nancy and Heylia James (Tonye Patano), her ghetto-dwelling, grandmotherly, African-American pot supplier, alternate between fun and fear.

Heylia initially viewed Nancy as a naive waif, but as Nancy captured more sales (with a homegrown strain labeled MILF Weed by smitten guest star Snoop Dogg), Heylia threatened to whack her.

Heylia later orchestrated the murder of a crooked Drug Enforcement Administration agent who briefly married Nancy to keep from testifying against her if she were busted.

Season 3 focuses heavily on family, Kohan says. Monday's premiere picks up where last season ended — a standoff over Nancy and Conrad's 30-pound crop between the Armenian pot growers and U-turn, a menacing dealer played by Page Kennedy. U-turn coerces Nancy to work for him. Despite his bluster, his gangsta style will help her confidence and street cred.

Silas (emerging teen heartthrob Hunter Parrish) gets busted for stealing Agrestic's street security cameras and drug-free zone signs, while Shane (Alexander Gould) embellishes Nancy's résumé so she's more hirable for a straight job.

Two new cast members surface in later episodes: Matthew Modine will appear as a slick developer building the Christian community of Majestic, which will become a fertile new drug market for Nancy. And former Full House pixie Mary-Kate Olsen will appear as Tara Lindman, a Christian teen who becomes Silas' girlfriend.

Modine says he was unfamiliar with Weeds before being sought for the role, but he realized he was onto something cool after his 16-year-old daughter "went crazy" knowing he might be cast.

Showtime's Greenblatt hopes Weeds, which fast became one of the cable channel's most-watched shows, lasts several seasons. Whenever it ends, dysfunction likely will rule.

"Jenji doesn't like happy endings," Perkins says. "It won't be, 'Everyone's life is fine.' Ultimately, it will end tragically."

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2007-08-08-weeds_N.htm?csp=34


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