Tag: Canada's Drag Race

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Sort Of (Nov. 15, 9 p.m., CBC and CBC Gem)

I spent a Saturday night earlier this month in the Hot Docs Bloor Cinema, which was packed with adoring fans of “Sort Of,” people of all ages, cultures, gender identities and sexualities who were there for a preview of its first three Season 2 episodes.

If star and co-creator Bilal Baig was nervous at all they didn’t show it, but there’s got to be some pressure involved when you’re putting out a sophomore season of such a critical darling. The first season won a Peabody Award, was named Program of the Year at the Banff World Media Festival Rockie Awards and Best Comedy Series at the Canadian Screen Awards.

The good news is that Baig, co-creator Fab Filippo and the other people who make “Sort Of” haven’t let all that attention interfere with the secret sauce that turned it into a hit in the first place.

The show, like its lead character Sabi (Baig), is still true to itself: a heartfelt, clever, witty, slice-of-life dramedy that doesn’t pander to its characters or its audience.

As Season 2 begins, Sabi is dreading the arrival of their father, Imran (Dhirendra), from Dubai; they’re in a situationship with Olympia (Cassandra James); their friend and employer Bessy (Grace Lynn Kung) has awoken from her coma but is not the person she was before her bike accident; and things are dire financially for Deenzie (Becca Blackwell), owner of the bar from which Sabi derives part of their income. Lack of said income has created tension with Sabi’s sister, Aqsa (Supinder Wraich), from whom they rent a room.

All Sabi wants, they confide to Bessy, is the kind of easy, uncomplicated love that actor Rachel McAdams undoubtedly has. It’s clear from the three of eight episodes made available for review that love in its various forms will continue to be complicated, not just for Sabi but for their family, their best friend 7ven (Amanda Cordner), their employer Paul (Gray Powell) and the kids they nanny, Violet (Kay Kanashiro) and Henry (Aden Bedard).

But the beauty of the series lies in those complications and the fact it doesn’t indulge in stereotypes or cliches.

Imran, for instance, rather than being the strict, macho Pakistani father you might expect, is a man struggling to adjust to the fact that his son has transitioned into someone else, but not in a deliberately hurtful way. And Sabi’s mother, Raffo (Ellora Patnaik), is making noticeable progress in learning to accept Sabi as they are.

Where the characters will all end up in relationship to each other remains to be seen, but the journey, based on what I’ve seen so far, is still an engaging and meaningful one.

Fleishman Is in Trouble (Nov. 17, Disney+)

Fleishman is in trouble and he’s not the only one in this TV adaptation of the bestselling Taffy Brodesser-Akner novel.

Indeed, Toby Fleishman (Jesse Eisenberg), his ex-wife Rachel (Claire Danes), and friends Libby (Lizzy Caplan) and Seth (Adam Brody) are essentially avatars for anyone who’s struggled with divorce, aging, identity and just relating to their fellow human beings.

Lead character Toby is a hepatologist (a doctor who specializes in the liver) newly divorced from Rachel, a highly successful talent agent. He has recently reconnected with his best friends from college, stay-at-home mom Libby and single finance bro Seth.

When we first meet 40-something Toby he has recently discovered dating apps and the smorgasbord of horny women available to him, a distraction from the unease he feels now that he’s no longer married to Rachel. But then Rachel drops their two kids off at his new apartment in the middle of the night so she can attend a yoga retreat.

When her absence goes from days to weeks, without so much as a text or a phone call, Toby writes it off as just Rachel being selfish, which aligns with his view of her as a woman who prioritizes moneymaking and social climbing over her own children.

That’s also the view that we have initially of Rachel, whom we see in flashbacks of the marriage, while Toby comes off as a man more interested in helping people than in materialism, disdainful of the rich friends Rachel has collected.

But just as the characters’ perceptions shift as they go from young adulthood to middle age, so do ours as the eight episodes progress.

A chance meeting between Rachel and Libby offers a drastically different explanation for the weeks that she disappeared and why the marriage fell apart, and it doesn’t paint Toby in the most flattering of lights.

Libby, meanwhile, is having a crisis of her own, one exacerbated by reconnecting with Toby. She struggles to reconcile the aspiring writer she was, working for a men’s magazine in Manhattan, with the New Jersey housewife she’s become, which leads to her pulling a mini-disappearing act of her own on her husband and children.

Quite honestly, I wasn’t sure I was going to like “Fleishman Is in Trouble” after the first episode, assuming I was in for endless skewering of entitled New Yorkers and the male ego. But I got sucked into this tale of unsated desire and insecurity, and settling and compromising, and the picture it paints of our flawed humanity.

Libby, our narrator, who’s so appealingly played by Lizzy Caplan, says at one point there are no real villains in life. There are no real villains in “Fleishman Is in Trouble” either, just relatably imperfect people coming to terms with the vagaries of imperfect lives.

Disney+ also has new series “The Santa Clauses” (Nov. 16), in which reigning Santa Scott Calvin (Tim Allen) searches for a replacement Kris Kringle; musical comedy “Disenchanted” (Nov. 18), a sequel to the 2007 film starring Amy Adams and Susan Sarandon, with Adams and Patrick Dempsey returning, and Maya Rudolph taking up the mantle of evil queen bee; holiday special “Best in Snow” (Nov. 18), hosted by Tituss Burgess; and “Elton John Live: Farewell from Dodger Stadium” (Nov. 20), a livestream of the singer’s last concert from Los Angeles.

Odds and Ends

If you can’t get enough “Drag Race,” there’s a new series, “Canada’s Drag Race: Canada vs. the World” (Nov. 18), in which Canadian alumni Icesis Couture, Kendall Gender, Rita Baga and Stephanie Prince compete against drag artists from New Zealand, England, Wales and the U.S. to become “Queen of the Mother-Pucking World.” The judges are Canucks Brooke Lynn Hytes, Brad Goreski and Traci Melchor, and apparently Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will make a guest appearance. Crave also has “A Christmas Story Christmas” (Nov. 17), a sequel to the holiday classic “A Christmas Story,” with Peter Billingsley reprising his role as Ralphie; Season 2 of “The Sex Lives of College Girls” (Nov. 17); Season 3 of “The L Word: Generation Q” (Nov. 18); and the 37th annual “Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony” (Nov. 19 at 8 p.m., HBO), featuring Pat Benatar, Duran Duran, Eminem, Eurythmics, Dolly Parton, Lionel Richie and more.

Speaking of music, PBS has “Next at the Kennedy Center: A Joni Mitchell Songbook” (Nov. 18, 9 p.m.), in which various artists pay tribute to the Canadian legend by performing adaptations of her songs with the National Symphony Orchestra, led by Vince Mendoza. PBS also has a special episode of “American Experience” called “Taken Hostage” (Nov. 14 and 15, 9 p.m.), a two-part documentary about the Iran hostage crisis of 1979 that features Canadians Hilary Brown and Carole Jerome among other interviewees.

The weekly Netflix haul (and I’m only including the stuff that sounds interesting to me) includes the documentary “In Her Hands” (Nov. 16), about one of Afghanistan’s first female mayors; etiquette series “Mind Your Manners” (Nov. 16); movie “The Wonder” (Nov. 16), based on Emma Donoghue’s novel about a seemingly miraculous child in rural Ireland; German horror series “1899” (Nov. 17), set aboard a migrant vessel en route to the new world; Season 3 of the dark comedy series “Dead to Me” (Nov. 17); and documentary “Pepsi, Where’s My Jet?” (Nov. 17), about an advertising campaign gone awry and the kid who sued the pop-maker for a fighter jet.

CBC’s “The Passionate Eye” has “Wall Street Blues” (Nov. 18, 9 p.m.), a look at the GameStop saga and whether it was truly a turning point in the democratization of money.

Prime Video’s offerings include two Amazon Original films, “Sugar” (Nov. 18), based on the true story of the so-called “Cocaine Cowgirls,” and “The People We Hate at the Wedding” (Nov. 18), a comedy starring Kristen Bell and Ben Platt; as well as “Where the Crawdads Sing” (Nov. 18), the movie adaptation of the bestselling novel starring Daisy Edgar-Jones.

Apple TV+ has a new film of its own, the musical “Spirited” (Nov. 18), starring Will Ferrell as the Ghost of Christmas Present and Ryan Reynolds as the “Scrooge” he tries to reform.

Anything starring Keeley Hawes usually deserves consideration in my book, although I wasn’t able to preview “Crossfire” (Nov. 15, BritBox), in which she plays an ex-cop caught up in a hostage situation at a Canary Islands hotel.

Finally, if you have made it through all 11 seasons of “The Walking Dead” — which I have, but just barely, so badly has the quality declined — the whole thing wraps up Nov. 20 at 9 p.m. on AMC and AMC+. AMC+ also has Season 2 of the violent “Gangs of London” on Nov. 17.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time and I’ve verified the times where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste. The Odds and Ends section includes shows that I have not watched.