I also don't have the words to describe the show, but it does one thing very very very very very well: it somehow invokes in every viewer the same feelings of unrest and discomfort, which is a unique experience to behold. A24 does it pretty well with a lot of things, but White Lotus is a masterclass in encouraging an audience to get comfortable with being uncomfortable.
As for the words to describe the show: I think we can find them if we put our heads together! There are words, they're just not..strung together in the appropriate order quite yet.
Comfortable with being uncomfortable is exactly it. And you're absolutely right that the right words are out there, it's just a matter of getting them in the right order, which is so @#$&! hard but also so damn satisfying when it finally happens.
I would describe White Lotus as “a show I would not really want to watch with my mother or daughter.” And so I consider you brave. And I delight in your proper elevation of tv - it’s where I learned all the best stuff too. I am surprised though that Love Boat didn’t make the Irena canon?
Ha! There were definitely a couple of moments when I was like, "Hmm, should I really have suggested watching this show?" but for the most part the awkwardness was minimal. Nothing like watching "Moscow on the Hudson" with my mom and dad and maternal grandmother during the scene where Robin Williams and Maria Conchita Alonso are taking a bath together. Probably in my Top 10 of Most Excruciating Moments of My Life.
I SO badly wanted to add the Love Boat but it didn't fit thematically. Though I do have a story about it... stay tuned!
"1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. 8..." still rings around my brain as does Sesame Street's "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12" pinball song. The latter was an educational show, but for the record, I think of trash tv as "cleansing the palate" of my brain to receive more substantial material. At breathtakingly near to 50, I have now lived in my host country longer than I ever did in my "home" one...and now feel more at home here than there. And yet I have missed out on the very things you embraced when you arrived from Moscow: all the tv references, candy, games, some expressions - the "bits and bobs" (see what I did there?) that one picks up effortlessly when immersed in a culture from childhood. In both countries, I feel at once like an outside and insider. I am part of the framework...and yet not. I can see things from the outside and from within. I consider our position as people living where they were not born as a privilege.
YES! That liminal space between belonging and not-belonging is so fascinating. My Russian is pretty much preserved in amber (circa late 1970s), so all the new slang and pop culture references—all the bits and bobs you mention—make me feel like a total outsider. But I also often miss some of the reference points of my American-born contemporaries—the life they experienced before they were nine. At the same time, being able to be both inside and outside a culture is a rare and really cool vantage point, and yes, a privilege.
I also don't have the words to describe the show, but it does one thing very very very very very well: it somehow invokes in every viewer the same feelings of unrest and discomfort, which is a unique experience to behold. A24 does it pretty well with a lot of things, but White Lotus is a masterclass in encouraging an audience to get comfortable with being uncomfortable.
As for the words to describe the show: I think we can find them if we put our heads together! There are words, they're just not..strung together in the appropriate order quite yet.
Comfortable with being uncomfortable is exactly it. And you're absolutely right that the right words are out there, it's just a matter of getting them in the right order, which is so @#$&! hard but also so damn satisfying when it finally happens.
I would describe White Lotus as “a show I would not really want to watch with my mother or daughter.” And so I consider you brave. And I delight in your proper elevation of tv - it’s where I learned all the best stuff too. I am surprised though that Love Boat didn’t make the Irena canon?
Ha! There were definitely a couple of moments when I was like, "Hmm, should I really have suggested watching this show?" but for the most part the awkwardness was minimal. Nothing like watching "Moscow on the Hudson" with my mom and dad and maternal grandmother during the scene where Robin Williams and Maria Conchita Alonso are taking a bath together. Probably in my Top 10 of Most Excruciating Moments of My Life.
I SO badly wanted to add the Love Boat but it didn't fit thematically. Though I do have a story about it... stay tuned!
"1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. 8..." still rings around my brain as does Sesame Street's "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12" pinball song. The latter was an educational show, but for the record, I think of trash tv as "cleansing the palate" of my brain to receive more substantial material. At breathtakingly near to 50, I have now lived in my host country longer than I ever did in my "home" one...and now feel more at home here than there. And yet I have missed out on the very things you embraced when you arrived from Moscow: all the tv references, candy, games, some expressions - the "bits and bobs" (see what I did there?) that one picks up effortlessly when immersed in a culture from childhood. In both countries, I feel at once like an outside and insider. I am part of the framework...and yet not. I can see things from the outside and from within. I consider our position as people living where they were not born as a privilege.
YES! That liminal space between belonging and not-belonging is so fascinating. My Russian is pretty much preserved in amber (circa late 1970s), so all the new slang and pop culture references—all the bits and bobs you mention—make me feel like a total outsider. But I also often miss some of the reference points of my American-born contemporaries—the life they experienced before they were nine. At the same time, being able to be both inside and outside a culture is a rare and really cool vantage point, and yes, a privilege.