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A bittersweet black comedy that has been running on Showcase since 2005, Weeds is the story of a young widow in the sunny California suburbs who begins selling marijuana in a desperate attempt to recover financially from her husband's sudden death.
The premise is serviceable, but it's the writing and the acting that really make this show. Mary-Louise Parker is marvellous as Nancy Botwin, the frazzled single mom trying to keep dangerous secrets from her teenaged sons and her nosy neighbours. Kevin Nealon is hilarious as the aggressively incompetent stoner who happens to run the city council. The dead husband's younger brother, Andy (Justin Kirk), is a lazy freeloader (and another stoner). Romany Malco and Indigo play Conrad and Vaneeta, Nancy's canny, no-nonsense pot dealers.
Agrestic, the ironically-named fictional suburb in which Weeds is set, is filled with shallow, pathetic, but somehow likeable people. (The worst of the lot is probably Celia Hodes, the alcoholic, self-centred, malignant PTA leader played by Elizabeth Perkins.) The opening sequence for the show beautifully captures the rot at the heart of the American Dream: identical joggers, schoolchildren, and businessmen walk identical manicured streets as a singer comments on their ticky tack reality.
The script brilliantly manages to combine sympathy for the characters and unflinching honesty about their flaws. Nancy is a decent woman who's way out of her depth. She's smart, but her life so far has been sheltered, and she's forced by her circumstances to make far too many snap decisions that may mean life or death for her and for her children. It's a tough role, but Parker pulls it off.
The plot is very clever, and the dialogue is foulmouthed and cutting. This show is a keeper.
BrevityQuest07
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