Tag Archives: Todd Biermann

TV Review: Broad City S3E09 Getting There

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Broad City airs at 10 PM EST on Comedy Central.

In the penultimate episode of Broad City Season 3, the show has gone full fledged serialized, and there’s even a little “to be continued” tag instead of the usual jokes and outtakes as the credits roll. But before Abbi and Ilana go into the great unknown aka Israel with Jared (played by Seth Green) as their tour guide, they get one last intense, fun, wacky, and a little morbid New York misadventure beginning with free (meaning stinky) yoga and ending with them taking their New York street skills to the JFK Airport as no one will get in their path of a free trip to Israel.

After last episode, which zeroed in on Abbi and Ilana’s relationships with Trey and Lincoln respectively, writers Jacobson and Glazer wisely decide to focus on their friendship even though Jaime (Arturo Castro) gets a few scene stealing moments like helping Ilana pack super quickly while wearing no pants and getting ready for a nice masturbation session on the couch a la Abbi dancing naked to “The Edge of Glory” when she realizes Bevers (John Gemberling) has left the apartment. And director Todd Biermann relies on a lot of Broad City standard visuals, like quick cuts between Ilana and Abbi contrasting their behavior, a fast tracking shot as they sprint through the JFK Airport, and a percussion heavy soundtrack. The episode’s story and look might come off as “typical Broad City“, but he also switches things up a little with a longer take of Abbi and Ilana playing a game of “fuck, marry, eat” when there’s a subway stoppage for 30 minutes and burns rubber as a 15 year old son of a taxi driver finally takes Abbi and Ilana to the airport immediately running a stop sign.

As mentioned earlier, the “going somewhere” plot has been use a multitude of times in Broad City, but Jacobson and Glazer keep things clever and occasionally dark, like a great conversation about eating a super cute baby and what parts would be the best on it followed by a lingering shot of the baby’s mother staring into the distance. This probably isn’t the weirdest thing she’s heard today. The recurring reference to Abbi’s butt (Ilana greets her as “Ass” when they try to take the subway to the airport.) also pays off in the form of a plot beat as Ilana’s prayer to it leads to the train restarting. And her hustling ability pays off in a slightly disgusting, yet mega hilarious joke that is also a callback to the “Pussy Weed” episode as Ilana smuggles weed in her vagina (Or “nature’s pocket”.) by wearing period blood stained jeans and gets past security pretty easily. Glazer and Jacobson poke fun at the societal taboos that unfortunately exist around menstruation, and the joke goes beyond simple satire by adding the nervous tension of smuggling drugs past the ever watchful TSA. All the events in the airport are super fun to watch, especially once Abbi and Ilana use their bags to creatively navigate the terminals.

And the final payoff of the episode after Glazer and Jacobson wisely build suspense by not revealing too much about their final destination, and their destination is a ten day trip to Israel as part of a real life program called Birthright meant for Jewish youth 18 to 26 to learn more about Judaism by visiting what Jared calls the “holiest of lands”. (Birthright has come under a lot of heat for being anti-Palestinian, against the two state solution, focusing on Zionism at the expense of other forms of Judaism, or just being plain unhelpful.) The last few minutes show how Abbi and Ilana feel like outsiders among the other Birthright participants, especially their creepy leader Jared, who mentions their “reproductive potential” as soon as they enter the cabin. Glazer and Jacobson go for broad parody of Birthright in this sequence while also creating a sad, emotional moment of Ilana and Abbi separating.

“Getting There” is zippy progression from the familiar Broad City plot beats of Abbi and Ilana running around New York with the added obstacles of teenage taxi drivers and airport issues to the unfamiliar as they go on the Birthright trip. We’ll find out if it’s the fun trip they thought it would be in next week’s season finale.

Also, special thanks to Graphic Policy’s Elana for giving me some additional information about Birthright.

Rating: 7.7

Broad City S3E06 “Philadelphia”

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Broad City airs at 10 PM EST on Comedy Central.

“Philadelphia” is the first Broad City episode to take place completely away from New York City as director Todd Biermann uses rapid cuts interspersed with Abbi and Ilana taking selfies of the other sleeping on the train to show their Amtrak and train journey from Penn Station to the Philly suburb Wayne, Pennsylvania. Yes, “Philadelphia” doesn’t take place in Philadelphia at all, but deals with the awkwardness of going back to your hometown as a young adult and seeing how it and you have changed. But this being Broad City, there are plenty of hijinks, including Ilana doing hardball negotiations in Mandarin Chinese over a commemorative Jon-Benet Ramsey Beanie Baby, a character named Syphilis, and a subplot about looking for Will Smith’s mom’s house because Wayne is technically west of Philadelphia that has an amazing punchline at the end of the episode.

The Jon-Benet Ramsey Beanie Baby subplot is yet another example of Ilana’s drive to make money in the most creative way possible as well as a bit of a satire on nostalgia culture and profiting on the death of celebrities. It also show that she has talent and energy, but doesn’t know how to harness it into her real job. Knowledge of Mandarin (Yiddish) Chinese, negotiation skills, and the exchange rate between the yen and the dollar could definitely come in handy on a C.V., but Ilana uses them to almost get $13,000 for a Beanie Baby. It’s pretty hilarious to see her constantly on the phone or taking shots of the plush toy while Abbi deals with the guilt of doing a dance benefit or inadvertently giving one of her former classmates the nickname “Syphilis” for the rest of his adult life after a field trip to colonial Williamsburg.

And the main throughline of “Philadelphia” is Abbi’s quest for redemption in her own way by returning the $900 that she raised for her classmate Alice, who was hit by a schoolbus on a Saturday. (So unlucky.) This money has been sitting in an envelope for God knows how long, and Abbi is on a trek across Wayne to find Alice and closure at the same time. But, like an P.I. with “expenses”, she and Ilana end up spending most of the money along the way on random things, like bowling shoes and liquor for teenagers. The teens don’t end up getting the booze or giving the girls a ride after a tense, silent Mexican standoff-like sequence where the police stare down the teens, then Abbi and Ilana, and run off. This scene is another footnote in an Infinite Jest length work about how visual comedy is all about editing. By the time she finally ends up at Alice’s (played by actress, model, future star of the Baywatch reboot) basically mansion, the money has dwindled down, and Abbi gets called an “asshole” for having the nerve to bring up her accident and lie about the money she raised. But even though she might not be the most tactful person, Abbi has an amazing friend named Ilana in her corner, who gives the Jon-Benet Ramsey Beanie Baby to Alice so Abbi can find “atonement” and not feel guilty any more. This is a big and kind of insane move on her account because Alice is a wealthy model with 10+ campaigns while Abbi and Ilana are barely scraping by. But the episode ends with a nice dance/cooking montage featuring Abbi, Ilana, and Mr. Abrams (played by the one and only Tony Danza) so it’s not all sad feelings and awkwardness.

Broad City continues its gold streak of guest stars with Tony Danza’s turn as Abbi’s divorced single dad and health enthusiast, Mr. Abrams. He’s the perfect mix of parental embarrassment and warmth with his anecdotes about Stevia and telling a young Abbi that he was divorcing her mom by the trash can so that she would stop playing in trash. Abbi still professes a liking for it, and this is a nice segue to the discovery of the Beanie Baby as well as her old dreadlocks from her jam band obsession day, which is a fun payoff from her Phish references in “Co-Op”. His elaborate handshake/dance/high five combination is truly an achievement in physical comedy from both Jacobson and Danza, and it’s a pity he doesn’t get more screen time.

In “Philadelphia”, writers/series creators Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer get down and dirty in exploring the complicated feelings of going back home and seeing your old friends and enemies success and failures in their careers and as human beings. It also continues Broad City Season 3’s trend of showing the consequences of Abbi and Ilana’s actions while not abandoning its weird and wonderful comedic take on life for twentysomethings.

Rating: 9.0

 

 

 

TV Review: Broad City S3E05 2016

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Broad City airs at 10 PM EST on Comedy Central.

In this week’s Broad City, Ilana deals with the woes of being unemployed and does some creative things to get money, like being an overenthusiastic bike messenger, doing dance moves on the subway in rainbow colored, and finally an unpaid volunteer at Hilary Clinton . (She thinks it’s paid though.) In Abbi’s storyline, a hairdresser (Who is a sassy gay man. Stereotype, much?) tweaks her neck after she pays with a coupon from Ilana’s old job, Deals, Deals, Deals, which throws her dreams of the perfect DMV photo into disarray. Luckily, her chiropractor Dr. Heller (played with warmth by the legendary Alan Alda) is there to save the day. And there’s a cameo from Clinton herself  at the end that maybe goes on for a little too long, but fits the surreal tone of this episode.

Director Todd Biermann  and writer Chris Kelly go deep into the continuity well in “2016” bringing back references to Trey’s (Paul W. Downs) gay porn career as Ilana’s brother Eliot (played by Glazer’s real life brother Eliot Glazer) finds “enjoyment” in a couple of his videos while Ilana freaks out about working for Clinton. (And Abbi mentions “pegging” in front of the presidential candidate herself.) And, in more of a visual callback, Biermann makes the DMV that Abbi goes to in Queens a mix of a low budget zombie film set, refugee camp, and waiting for the last lifeboat on the Titanic. He makes a nice contrast in lighting between the usual DMV and the “appointment” DMV, which is gaudy, filled with chocolates, a masseuse, and an incredibly polite concierge played with bombastic surrealism by first time actor Andrew Ward. The addition of this room sequence plus the nice subversion of “old people suck at the Internet” trope with Dr. Heller keeps the DMV plot line from being the same old “DMV is hell” joke for half an episode.

And Alan Alda is brilliant in his short scene as Abbi’s chiropractor as he shows genuine care for her by helping to sell her art, asking about her sleep, and evening her bangs after the hatchet job of a haircut. Abbi’s reaction of “I love you” can definitely stand in for the audience’s reaction, and he joins Kelly Ripa, Amy Poehler, and Patricia Clarkson as famous folks, who have shone in Broad City. (He does get to make the slightest of jokes about Abbi’s butt, which is basically a character in the show by now.) Dr. Heller feels like family to Abbi and with the reveal of Abbi’s old pictures on her phone (including her gay high school boyfriend) and next week’s episode taking place in her hometown of Philadelphia, Jacobson could get a chance to flesh out the pre-Ilana version of herself.

And speaking of Ilana, Glazer is pure madcap in her outfits, line deliveries, and body movements throughout “2016” and truly sells her passion for Hillary Clinton. She even gets a rare quiet moment soothing her friend Linda, who owns a temp agency and is going through a midlife crisis while Ilana is going through a quarter life one.  Hooray for intergenerational empathy! Also, a bike messenger is kind of a perfect job for her as she rides around New York via a fastly paced tracking shot from Biermann shouting, “Ass, ass, ass.”  as random passerbyswith her bike helmet/wig combo and makes acrobatic envelope throws. (She’s definitely the best TV bike messenger since Tyres from Spaced., a show that also combined insane surrealism with the harsh reality of life and work as a twentysomething.) There’s no scene of her getting fired so hopefully we get to go on more rides with Ilana. And speaking of firing, Glazer’s almost deadpan tone as she shows Hillary Clinton’s campaign office to Abbi while literally cleaning out her desk is kind of amazing.

Clinton’s cameo could be a great sight gag or a fun surrealist gag (in keeping with “2016’s” tone) a la Madeline Albright showing up in a Season Six episode of Gilmore Girls with a pair of winks, a perfect pantsuit, and Abbi and Ilana’s hilarious reaction. But it kind of rolls on, and Kelly even tries to shoehorn her into the Broad City universe with her adding the inflatable red thing from Ilana’s old job to her campaign office. But what this sequence does get right is how almost any of us would react to one of our heroes appearing out of the blue, and Glazer and Jacobson’s reactions are super genuine and passionate with a side of the slow mo that Broad City directors usually employ when Abbi and Ilana are getting fired up about something.

With a scene stealing guest performance from Alan Alda and some tremendous energy from Glazer, “2016” is a successful dip into the surreal side of the Broad City universe even with the slight awkwardness of the end credits cameo tag featuring a Democratic candidate for president.

Rating: 8.5