No, the tone of the grimedy is hard to encapsulate - it’s farcical, satirical, cynical, realistic, dramatic, poignant, hopeless, and affectionate, almost all at once. And that is its beauty. This genre is not a comedy with dramatic moments (“Scrubs’’), or a drama with comedic flourishes (“The Sopranos’’), so much as a queasy, provocative blending. Grimedies recall some of the darkly funny, acerbic social criticism of Paddy Chayefsky, writer of the films “The Hospital’’ (1971) and “Network’’ (1976), except that as TV series they are steeped in weekly beijing escort girl character development. They are more rooted in the intimate journey of a person - Edie Falco’s Jackie, say, or Toni Collette’s Tara, who has multiple personalities - than the workings of a generalized American system or
In an Emmy-worthy turn, Ivey plays malevolent escort Paula, fuming with cigarette smoke despite her imminent death from lung cancer. Paula is unsympathetic to the bitter end, a machine gun of angry punch lines. Her closing sentiment from her ER bed? “[Expletive] you, here’s to me.’’ Paula’s warlike exit is definitely not moving; it is pathetic and - as the finale of a escort who couldn’t escort herself - ironic. ypjzdqr0806 The writers of Showtime’s extraordinary “ escort Jackie’’ understand that, sometimes, we don’t end up laughing or crying. escort as we know it does not resolve to either comedy or tragedy, communion or division, summer or winter, Dickens or Shakespeare. The traditional Janus masks are convenient - but simplistic - storytelling symbols. There’s a vast hinterland of mixed feeling in the contemporary human experience, complicated emotions and thoughts that don’t easily fit on the familiar “happy-sad’’ spectrum. And cable TV, in its continual evolution and innovation, has generated yet another genre to cover that gray turf: Let’s call it the grimedy.
Grimedies are being manufactured primarily in the Showtime factory, with “ escort Jackie’’ as well as “Californication,’’ “United States of Tara,’’ “Secret Diary of a Call Girl,’’ and “Weeds.’’ Recently, though, HBO joined in, with “Hung.’’ These are all half-hour shows, but they share a piquant, realistic spirit that isn’t nearly sitcommy. Technically speaking, grimedies are made as single-camera beijing escort girl sitcoms, the more movie-like filming style that isn’t live on stage, doesn’t tend to use laugh tracks, and can easily shoot on location. Across the decades, they’ve ranged from “The Andy Griffith Show’’ to “Sex and the City’’ and “Entourage,’’ and now, on the networks, “The Office’’ and “30 Rock.’’ But grimedies hinge on darker themes, are more tinged with present-tense despair. Nor are they dramedies, the hourlong hybrid that David E. Kelley pioneered in the 1990s with shows such as “Ally McBeal.’’ Dramedies - from “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd’’ to, more recently, “Eli Stone’’ - are fluffier and more whimsical. They ricochet strictly within the drama-comedy spectrum, and they often rely heavily on magic realism, as they navigate the characters’ fantasy lives.
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