Man, do I
love this episode, or rather, the Hannah-and-Elijah-on-an-adventure portion of
the episode. Tons of fun, but it also
moves the plot forward. Other stuff
happens, and it’s not like it’s bad or anything, but I’m just so here for the
Hannah-Elijah stuff (episode premise spoilers.)
Hannah
meets with someone from an online publication who’s interested in her writing. She’s pitched the idea of doing a bunch of
cocaine and then writing an article about her experience, and naturally, this
seems like a reasonable enough idea to Hannah.
She sets off on obtaining her “research,” Elijah in tow, and the two
have a drug-fueled romp through Brooklyn that involves dancing, clothes-swapping,
and some things that probably shouldn’t be said. In other news, Marnie runs into a douchey
artist she idolizes, and he takes her back to his studio.
I’ll
repeat that I’m good with pretty much everything that happens here. I enjoy Hannah’s weird interactions with her
downstairs neighbor, who she hopes can hook her up with coke, and Marnie’s
scenes with artist guy (Booth) are messed up in an interesting, entertaining
way. But let’s be real: this is all about Elijah and Hannah doing
cocaine together. While it’s all great,
my favorite scene actually takes place just on the cusp of their adventure,
after they’ve taken their first lines but are still back at the apartment. Their rapid-fire stream-of-consciousness
dialogue is terrific, along with their super touchy-feeliness and Elijah’s
almost-“religious” revelation that Hannah should “leave [her] fucking mark” on
their apartment (along with Hannah mistakenly thinking he means with her pee.)
But yeah,
it’s all fantastic. I like the little
details, like the twitchy, paranoid way they hold hands as they prepare to
enter a subway station or the hilariously-old photo on the driver’s license
Elijah uses to make their lines of coke.
There are lots of great lines and all sorts of fun business going on in
this storyline, and the way it draws itself back into the bigger plot of this
part of the season feels authentic and earned.
I like that, too, that it’s a bunch of fun craziness but it also has relevance for the characters
and their stories.
I’m
struck here by Andrew Rannells’s talent compared to the younger and less experienced
members of the cast. There’s a big scene
between Hannah and Marnie late in the episode, and I can feel both Lena Dunham
and Allison Williams acting so hard. You can tell they’re both giving it their
all, but that in itself is an issue, because we shouldn’t be able to tell that.
In contrast, Rannells’s performance just seems so effortless. I absolutely buy whatever ludicrous thing
comes out of Elijah’s mouth, and he sells me completely on whatever Elijah is
feeling at any given moment: blasé,
hyped, elated, confused, freaked, annoyed, distracted, etc. I have to stop and
remind myself how little on-camera experience Rannells had at this point. Yes, he’d been acting quite a bit longer than
Dunham or Williams, and he already had a Tony nomination for Mormon under his belt, but while he’s
undeniably great in that show, it operates very much in a sort of
heightened-reality space, and it would’ve been entirely possible that Rannells
could’ve struggled to adjust to the very different tone of TV shows in general
and this one in particular. On the
contrary, though, he’s fantastic. I can
honestly say he draws my attention as soon as he appears onscreen, and once
again, it’s more than just my Andrew Rannells bias behind that.
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