Apple TV+’s Unabashedly Soapy, Star-Studded Palm Royale Is a Weird, Campy Delight

There is something just so utterly delightful about watching a series that isn’t afraid to be soapy. And Apple TV+’s Palm Royale, which revels in both its surprising twists and shocking weirdness, is not afraid of anything, it seems. Unlike its Apple peer The Morning Show, which paints itself as prestige while stumbling through classic tropes and melodrama with a bit of a visible wince, Palm Royale employs backstabbing, identity-swapping, affair-ridden drama with a delicious smirk, all elevated by humor that insists the creative team is more than in on the joke—but doesn’t allow its cast to get too wink-wink-nudge-nudge-y, lest they undercut the popcorn-worthy twists and turns in store every single episode. To put it plainly: Palm Royale is a sudsy melodrama teeming with weird and wonderful humor, and it’s a must-watch delight. 

Palm Royale, from creator and showrunner Abe Sylvia, follows Maxine (Kristen Wiig), a ‘60s housewife (and country-accented outsider) who is willing to do anything to break her way into Palm Beach high society, and most specifically, the exclusive Palm Royale club. When she arrives, she’s met with the vulturous mavens she reads about in the gossip rag The Shiny Sheet: heiress to an ailing husband Evelyn (Allison Janney), the adulterous and unabashedly rude Dinah (Leslie Bibb), the shady Raquel (Claudia Ferri), the persistent and catty Mary (Julia Duffy), and the once-queen Norma (Carol Burnett), who sits in a coma after embolizing. Even with friendly faces like bartender Robert (Ricky Martin), manicurist Mitzi (Kaia Gerber), and feminist Linda (Laura Dern) on her side, Maxine’s goal remains unchanged in the face of many, many roadblocks: become the queen of Palm Beach. As she struggles to carve out space for herself amongst a society that flinches away from change and anyone deemed “uncouth,” she must ask herself: how much is she willing to sacrifice in order to get what she wants, and what’s left for her once she achieves the status she so desperately desires? 

Maxine herself is an incredible character, and the perfect anchor for a series that features so many figures that are larger than life, with problems that feel untouchable in so many ways. Wiig leans hard into Maxine’s cringe-worthy moments, especially as she spends the first episode groveling at Dinah’s feet. She’s simultaneously ridiculous and yet still grounded, with her pearly white smile, fake tan, and bleach blonde hair aiding in the facade before the series allows her to blossom into one of its most tangibly human characters. Maxine is so tenacious and downright genuine that you can’t help but root for her, even if you spend the entire season trying to parse out whether she’s just a well-meaning country girl bumbling her way through polite society or if she’s the most ruthless and calculated woman to grace the hallowed halls of the Palm Royale. (Or if, maybe, it might just be a little bit of both.)

In a series as star-studded as Palm Royale, the cast and their performances are worth the price of admission alone. Carol Burnett, in particular, is magnetic as the comatose Norma, especially as her condition improves over the course of the season. In some episodes, she has a sum-total of about three lines of unintelligible dialogue, or a few minutes of physical comedy through exaggerated movements and facial expressions, and yet she still steals every single scene she’s in. Laura Dern undeniably has the most fun as hippie Linda, alongside deliciously wicked performances from Allison Janey and Leslie Bibb. Despite being criminally underutilized, Kaia Gerber is as charming as ever here, and other secondary characters like Ann of the Shiny Sheet (Mindy Cohn, my forever Velma), feminist Virginia (Amber Chardae Robinson), and Linda’s loving father Skeet (Bruce Dern) are all stand-outs in this incredibly deep bench of talent. And Ricky Martin’s moving performance as the heart-achingly kind and fiery Robert acts as the true heart of the series, especially in his scenes with Wiig and Burnett. 

Even in all its twists and turns and delightful soapiness, Palm Royale isn’t perfect, and takes a few episodes to find its tone and settle into a satisfying rhythm. Its political commentary is far from searing, and the frequent cuts to Nixon on TV sets across Palm Beach are overdone. And even though this series tries terribly hard to incorporate the powder-keg vibes of the 1969 political landscape, its commentary often falls to the wayside in favor of the rich, white drama at its center. Virginia, like The Morning Show’s Chris (Nicole Beharie) and Lessons in Chemistry’s Harriet (Aja Naomi King) before her, feels like a side note, only brought in to remind viewers that the ‘60s sucked for anyone misfortunate enough to be a non-white non-straight non-man, until it quickly glides back to its central characters’ pomp and circumstance. And for a series that bills itself as a comedy, the episodes sometimes feel overlong, without enough snappy beats and humorous moments to justify their runtimes; but as the season leans further into its melodrama the closer it gets to its grand finale, it’s almost impossible to turn away. 

However, in that grand finale, it commits what has quickly become the cardinal sin of any streaming series: refusing to truly wrap up any of its plotlines, and instead cutting to black with a massive cliffhanger in a move that feels more suited to a midseason finale than a true season-ender. While, fortunately, Palm Royale stands a little more than a snowball’s chance in hell at being renewed than its streaming peers due to Apple TV+’s generous track record of allowing its series to actually continue after one season, it’s still annoying to watch an entire season of TV and feel absolutely zero closure for every minute twist and head-spinning plot that just unraveled over 10 hour-long episodes. 

But even in its flaws, Palm Royale is still a hell of a good time, and a sudsy, campy series to carry us through the spring TV season. It’s perfect for anyone craving Desperate Housewives drama on a ‘60s backdrop, or anyone looking for a breezy, ridiculous series to get invested in week-to-week. It’s like reading a well-loved novel poolside on a sunny day: engaging enough to keep our attention, and vapid and juicy enough to feel like a vacation all its own, to a land where gossip is an untouchable currency, and the cost of fitting in is more trouble than the pain of standing out. A stay at Apple’s Palm Royale is the perfect way to bid winter farewell, with hopes for many returns in the future. 

Palm Royale premieres Wednesday, March 20th on Apple TV+, with new episodes airing weekly. 

Anna Govert is the TV Editor of Paste Magazine. For any and all thoughts about TV, film, and her unshakable love of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you can follow her @annagovert.

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