Party Down. One of the great comedies of our generation, and easily one of the most under-rated shows in the history of television. Thankfully, there is a Party Down movie being filmed this summer, the news of which inspired me to sit down with the DVD’s and make my way through the series again. And now here I am, sharing these thoughts with you. So without further ado, let’s talk about Party Down‘s pilot – which is actually one of the show’s weakest episodes.
As the series premiere, “Willow Canyon Homeowners Annual Party” was more about setting up who the characters were rather than trying to provide a completely coherent half hour of television. The comedy’s a bit all over the place, and most of the cast is forced to play things pretty straight, save for the characters of Ron Donald (Ken Marino) and Constance Carnell (Jane Lynch), who are let loose from the word go and get to be wild with physical comedy and what not. Ultimately, the pilot is a mixed bag , but its a great introduction to a show that only gets better as it goes along.
Ron Donald is the team leader of Part Down Catering, managing a crew of actors and writers in various stages of professional failure, working a job they think is just a stepping stone, but has really become their profession. There’s Roman (Martin Starr), whose hard sci-fi is so hard no one wants to read it, way past her acting prime Constance, struggling comedian Casey Kline (the always great Lizzie Caplan), and of course, the man in the overall Being Handsome business, Kyle Bradley (Ryan Hansen). They’re awful at their catering jobs, and are usually more focused on their personal and professional pursuits than the events they’re working.
The homeowner’s party at the center of the episode is the first gig of newcomer Henry Pollard (Adam Scott, in his finest role to date), who is hitting rock bottom. A former actor who’s career become known for one line in a commercial, he’s given up on the dream and accepted that he’s pretty much a failure. With nothing else to do, he returns to the catering company he worked for eight years ago, before his big break in Hollywood.
For the most part, the jokes involved with the party itself fall pretty flat. The couple hosting the party are very broad archetypes of frustrated suburban couples, and they don’t even integrate the characters into the story well – something the show figures out by the hilarious second episode – instead, giving main characters bits of dialogue to add some depth to their characters.
Unsurprisingly, the catering crew themselves feel drawn in pretty broad strokes throughout “Willow Canyon Homeowners Annual Party”. Henry is super depressing, Constance is super wacky, Ron is super desperate… you get the idea, and it’s the pilot’s biggest weakness. Characters are quite one-noted, even for a show’s pilot… but once again, it’s something the show quickly learns to improve on.
There are still some funny bits, though, and the wit (and cynicism) of the writing is very apparent. The Repo Man bit is pretty funny, and there is some good physical bits from Constance and Ron, although the bit with the house owner and Henry falling in the pool was a bit flat – physical comedy isn’t one of Adam Scott’s strong points, and thankfully, the show mostly leaves those to Marino and Lynch for the rest of the show.
What the show really nails home in the pilot is the tone, which is a lot darker than most people like from their comedy shows. These people are struggling in their lives, not really knowing if what they’re trying to is really even worth it. It’s a story we’ve heard a million times, but never without the overly dramatic, super high stakes, fighting the powers that be kind of mentality they all have. Like Roman says in a later episode “the shit’s random. Someone will succeed, and someone else will fail.” (I’m pararphrasing, but you get the point). In other words, Party Down is not show for people expecting happy endings and big hugs with rainbows and sprinkles at the end of every episode – the writers of this show treat their characters quite abrasively, and really display the uglier shades of failure in the eat-em-up, spit-em-out culture of Hollywood.
It feels like I just bashed on the show for seven hundred words, but like I said, this is arguably the show’s weakest episode – things only improve from here, and the show gets funnier and more poignant as it goes along. There are some narrative threads lightly alluded to or introduced in the premiere, like Henry and Casey, and Kyle’s band (who we get to see briefly in the series finale).
Other thoughts/observations:
- Constance’s line about Gene Hackman was hilarious… “He said… you should be committed.”
- Best conversation of the episode goes to Henry and Kyle, which has both the hilarious exchanges about agents and bartending.
- How often is there a pilot of a show on pay cable like HBO, Showtime and Starz, and the only nudity you get is full-frontal male? Way to buck the trend.
- another well-directed pilot from Fred Savage, who’s making quite a name for himself as a TV director. Good use of the mockumentary style, without the crappy interviews and self-exposes.
- this show sat in development for so long, the original Henry and Ron were Paul Rudd (a producer and co-creator) and Steve Carrell. There also was a version of the pilot filmed with Andrea Savage as Casey, but she does re appear for a guest spot in season 2 playing a woman who used to be a comedian.
