Me Gusta: December 10th, 2021
Me Gusta: December 10th, 2021
Best of 2021
It’s that time of year when Christmas decorations go up, people check what kind of COVID test they need to board their planes home, and critics release their Best of 2021 lists, full of films that Academy voters care about and the rest of us will probably fall asleep to on Netflix (after arguing with our moms about how we’re not “still living like a college student” because everyone in New York lives like that). I have put together my own list, which you know will be much better because a) it is I who wrote it and b) I followed a strict rule for maximum relevancy: the thing can’t be a sequel, prequel, or any season past the first one—so this is basically a list of 2021 cultural newborns. Welcome to the world, little babies! See you again when you’re rebooted.
Best new play of 2021: The Antelope Party
The pitch: it’s basically that story I wrote about Watchmen fans but if they were into My Little Pony instead, and what corrupted them was not social media but fascism.
Me gusta porque: I first came across this play in 2017, when I was part of The Lark’s Playwrights Week (RIP). The playwrights were asked to interview each other for social media; I was assigned Eric John Meyer’s The Antelope Party, which I read the night before and simply could not put down. It follows a group of “bronies” (adults who cosplay as characters of the TV show My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic) who start turning on each other when a neighborhood watch (the titular Antelope Party) begins recruiting its members. The genius of the play is that it never outgrows its size: the Rust Belt bronies and pegasisters don’t fall apart because of politics—they just buy into the party because they wanna impress the girl or get the boy or become the cool guy in the group. When confronted with the destructive power of the system they’re endorsing, they shrink and fumble, ascribing responsibility to a larger “they;” Meyer makes the successful (and, in spite the subject matter, often hilarious) argument that there is no “they,” just “us”—and we’re fucking this up. I was thrilled to see the Dutch Kills production, which was canceled in 2020 due to COVID, up on its feet this year—the team outdid themselves, and I can’t wait to see where it goes next.
Where? The production wrapped up last week, but you can get the script (which reads great) from Broadway Play Publishing (or, you know, Amazon).
Runner up: Arturo Luís Soria’s Ni Mi Madre, the only show this season that made cry. Granted, that’s because I was probably the only person in the audience who could understand all of it—Soria switches between English, Spanish, and Portuguese as he recounts his mother’s life story. Solo shows can often be too self-indulging, but Soria’s serious (and by that I mean committed, not formal—the show is quite funny) efforts to empathize with a woman who in many ways traumatized him completely won me over.
Best new novel of 2021: The Husbands
The pitch: The Stepford Wives but it’s husbands (this is not my way of pitching it, this is literally the plot of the book).
Me gusta porque: While I notoriously dislike adaptations, reboots, and any general sort of bringing shit back, that’s usually because said reanimations are soulless—if you’re reviving something that already worked, you need to have a strong take (good example: Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal series for NBC, which was completely unnecessary but totally worth it). I’ve talked before about my love for Ira Levin, so when I read that Chandler Baker had remixed Stepford Wives in her latest novel, I was skeptical, but I was very gladly proven wrong. Baker knows she’s tackling a classic and therefore makes no attempts to surprise the reader: the husbands of Dynasty Ranch are acting like drones because of the exact reason you imagine. What makes the book such a compelling (and disturbing) read is that, like in the original, the protagonist is a wife, but her journey is the opposite: if Levin’s Joanna came to learn how exactly a bunch of successful women ended up becoming submissive housewives, Barker’s Nora discovers instead just what it takes to remain a successful woman if one is to marry a man and have his children. The novel will make you so angry, regardless of your gender, that by the end you’ll most likely agree that brainwashing your lazy partner is okay, if it means you’ll never have another argument about dishes.
Where? Macmillan.
Runner up: Sankofa, by Chibundu Onuzo. The plot is quite eye catching: Anna, a biracial woman living in London, discovers that the father she never knew is also the long-running ruler (a.k.a dictator) of a small (fictional) African nation, Banama. The novel skews more Eat, Pray, Love than The Last King of Scotland—Anna’s trip to Banama to meet her father ends up being more about meeting herself. But Onuzo’s prose is funny and engaging, and I really appreciated how she could hold space for the humanization of a character whose public savior persona looms as large as his crimes, arguing that historical oppression don’t quite excuse violence, but it does give it a context that may allow for, if not love, at least grace.
Best new TV series of 2021: The White Lotus
The pitch: it’s the “family goes on vacation” episode of any sitcom except with discussions of privilege and colonialism, uncomfortable sex scenes, and murder.
Me gusta porque: Game of Thrones was supposed to be the last “water cooler” show, after which the streaming monsters would trap us in our own personal bubbles where, at most, we would tweet out “is anyone watching this” and people would answer “I keep hearing good things but I haven’t tried it yet.” However, for a few weeks in the summer of 2021, it kinda felt like everyone I knew was watching The White Lotus and we all had theories and hot takes, and the world was a little normal again. Ironic, for a show that deals primarily with people who’d want the world to be a little normal again too—pining for the days when they didn’t have to feel guilty about their race and wealth and the fact that they’re spending their vacation on stolen land where the original caretakers now perform tribal dances for their dinner amusement. “Being a young man in this time right now can’t be easy,” says one of them, to which his son replies “Why? Because we can’t harass girls anymore?” If this makes the show sound like a lecture, rest assured that there’s a big spoonful of sugar: you mostly watch to find out which one of them will die by the end. Plus its social critique comes with several helpings of humor and winks (my favorite line is when, in response to her daughter saying that a friend has been diagnosed with “hypersensitivity” and can’t be around loud noises, Connie Britton’s character responds: “Who’s her physician? Lena Dunham?”). There are limits to how deep the show can go—its handling of race, in particular with Natasha Rothwell’s character, ends up replicating the dynamic it criticizes—but it does invite a reflection that stayed with me: the real pull of a vacation is the chance to become a version of ourselves that lives a completely different life, one that usually makes us a lot happier. So why aren’t we that person the rest of the year?
Where? HBO Max.
Runner up: Reservation Dogs, which got a lot of press for depressing reasons (there are almost no shows with all-Indigenous casts and creative teams) and not enough for its actual content, which I’d love to discuss more. This portrayal of a group of teenagers living in a reservation and dreaming of getting out challenged me with its languid pace, which some critics argued is the point—though “it’s boring on purpose” is not a solid argument in my book. I kept watching because of its characters (the cast is all around great), which the show simultaneously mocks and uplifts: consider ringleader Bear, who, every time someone mentions he got beat up by a rival gang, adds “I got a few good licks in” (he did not). Investing in this narrative paid off in surprising ways (there were tears), and I’m looking forward to seeing how it evolves in future seasons.
Shameless self-promotion
I did my own version of Spotify Wrapped on Twitter, where I catalogued the unbelievable amount of projects I undertook this year (including this newsletter!) Check it out for all the links, and to understand why I might be too tired to be nice to you this holiday season.