We know that Netflix has brought change to how we watch TV and how TV is made, but it’s also brought change to how we talk about TV. The weekly recap model of TV criticism is already being supplanted by marathon review binges, where websites try to have authoritative reviews of every episode of a Netflix show the day it launches. That cuts both ways, though: it’s turned immediate coverage into a mad dash, but it’s also blown open the window for more in-depth coverage, diminishing old concerns about timeliness. Just as Netflix shows live on the platform in perpetuity, always discoverable by a new audience at any moment, critics and writers can approach those shows in their own time, especially the more obscure ones that don’t arrive amid fusillades of hype.
Take Netflix Presents: The Characters: the sketch anthology show debuted on Netflix almost a month ago with ample praise within the comedy world but a muted wider response. The series is the sort of inspired, unusual play that a traditional network would probably never commit to, giving eight different comedians the freedom to create their own independent half-hour sketch showcase. Think of Comedy Central Presents or HBO’s One Night Stand comedy specials, only with filmed sketches instead of stand-up. This isn’t a sketch show with a troupe or company, like The State or Mr. Show. It’s eight unique voices given free rein over a half-hour of Netflix bandwidth, but with the same crew and director to lend everything a visual consistency. The quality obviously varies depending on your reaction to each specific comic, and even from sketch to sketch within episodes, but there’s not really a single installment that’s completely disappointing. The entire series is more than worth your time, especially if you’re interested in catching some of the best young writers and sketch performers in comedy today.
That talent includes Natasha Rothwell. The Saturday Night Live writer and occasional Nightly Show panelist describes a submissions process that sounds similar to most comedy writing jobs, but with a different outcome. She was invited to submit a packet to be considered for the show, incorporating both sketches she had written before for other jobs and new ideas she was fleshing out for the first time. Instead of a gig writing jokes or struggling to get sketches on air, though, she was trying out for a half-hour special. Most of what she sent made it into the final cut of her episode, and it reflects the smart, character-based work she’s known for.
“All the characters predated the special but were in various stages of completion,” Rothwell tells us. “Some were just pitches and ideas. Some were things I’d written for showcases—I’d done Just For Laughs and an NBC diversity showcase. Others were characters that I discovered while doing improv scenes that I wanted to flesh out. I’d write that down and write down things I’d say on stage that I thought would make for a good sketch.”
Others took a different approach. Kate Berlant, who also appears in John Early’s episode, saw The Characters as a chance to experiment. Her episode is “all new original content that I wrote specifically for The Characters,” she says. “I was initially paralyzed by the vastness of the opportunity. I decided to not be too precious and instead write new material that simply would be fun for me to perform.”
Henry Zebrowski, one of the more recognizable stars of The Characters, thanks to his lead role in Adult Swim’s Your Pretty Face is Going to Hell and appearances in The Wolf of Wall Street, the recent Heroes reboot and in the Jack Warden role in Amy Schumer’s 12 Angry Men parody, approached it from yet another angle. He turned his episode into a collaboration with his long-running sketch troupe Murderfist, which dates back to his college days at Florida State University. They adapted a couple of character ideas from old Murderfist sketches, and then whipped up some new ideas that they never would’ve had the budget for before.
“The question for us was ‘how do you put 14 years of doing sketch into 30 minutes?’” Zebrowski explains. “Our concept was History of the World Pt. 1 if it was directed by David Lynch. We wanted it to feel like a satanic Hanna-Barbera cartoon. The special is a tribute to the intense style of comedy of Murderfist that my partners and I have been a part of for many years. I think we achieved that. It’s aggressive and it looks like it was made by crazy people.”