ALBERTO KING
Updated Monday, February 12, 2024-21:34
Atlanta Serial Killer, in general and in particular
When
Phoebe Waller-Bridge
announced that she was leaving
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
, the television adaptation of the
Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie
superhit stopped appealing to me as much. Because anything without Phoebe is worse than anything with Phoebe. With the series now available on Prime Video, I wonder what
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
would have been like if
Fleabag
's gifted creator
was still at the helm. Because
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
is already very good.
There was talk at the time of creative disagreements between Waller-Bridge and
Donald Glover
, star of the series and fashionable man since
Atlanta
and the video for
This is America
, the song by his musical alter ego
Childish Gambino
. Then I fantasized that
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
's marketing people
were baiting us with a fake game parallel to the one that underpins the series: two secret agents, forced to pretend to be a couple, soon become one for real, while the mysterious job that matching them becomes more and more complicated. But it was not a strategy of Prime Video, owner of the series:
Phoebe was really leaving.
After his departure, it is evident that control of the project remained in the hands of Donald Glover. He is listed, along with Francesca Sloane, as the creator of the series. Sloane was also part of
Atlanta
, as was Hiro Murai, who sets the tone for
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
by directing its first episodes. They are extraordinary and, above all, they are things that, in the hands of anyone else (except perhaps Phoebe Waller-Bridge), they could not be:
elegant, calm, grown-up and sexy
. Glover, Sloane and Murai forget a bit about Pitt and Jolie's film and reconstruct the sexual tension that underpinned all their comedy (and all their drama!) with new concepts and protagonists. These are Glover himself and
Maya Erskine
.
The Smiths of 2024 have a chemistry comparable to that of Brad and Angelina in that film that, although it did not change the course of cinema in 2005, it did
forever change that of pop culture
. 20 years later,
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
, the series, is more concerned with being a good series than with generating sauce. He's had enough with Phoebe.
It would be nice (no: it would be beautiful) if, at some point, Phoebe were part of the amazing list of guest stars that the series has. Some accept almost testimonial roles and that gives
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
an extra incredible charm. They range from
Alexander Skarsgrd to John Turturro, including Sarah Paulson and Úrsula Corberó
. They all shine. The series does not vampirize its glamor to attract attention, but rather offers characters, no matter how small, to show off. Almost all of the guest actor and actress Emmy nominations at the next Emmys should come from this cast. What Sharon Horgan does in her episode is out of this world. and Ron Perlman. And Parker Posey and Wagner Moura in a very difficult chapter in which
the series risks everything
. Although the truth is that, like their protagonists, Mr. and Mrs. Smith puts everything on the line almost all the time. Risk a lot and win everything. It's going to be on all the lists of the best series of 2024.