Though sometimes uneven, it’s a welcome new entrant among shows that follow women rebuilding their lives, and Buteau shines in the well-deserved spotlight.Īs the emotional anchor of the series, Buteau showcases a range that extends beyond the wise retorts that have earned her the nickname “Queen of Quips.” Buteau’s character-while hilarious-is relieved of having to serve as the show’s moral center, jokingly or otherwise.
Loosely based on Buteau’s 2020 essay collection of the same name, Survival of the Thickest is an effervescent, self-aware story of starting over that implicitly rejects the confines of the “fat best friend” trope. Mavis hastily leaves Jacque (Taylor Selé), moving out of their stylish Manhattan home and into a cramped Brooklyn apartment where her bedroom doesn’t have a door and her roommate doesn’t have boundaries. Survival of the Thickest, which began streaming last week, stars Buteau as Mavis Beaumont, a plus-size stylist reeling from a breakup kicked off by catching her rich photographer boyfriend in bed with a woman-but “not just any other woman, a skinny model version of me,” as she tells a friend. In her latest involvement with Netflix, Buteau takes center stage-and this time, she doesn’t have the answers.
And since 2020, Buteau has hosted The Circle, a chaotic Big Brother–esque reality series on which participants interact solely through a bespoke social network she keeps the uncanny show surprisingly watchable with her stream of self-referential commentary. At the beginning of the 2019 breakup comedy Someone Great, Buteau’s character delivers a brisk self-esteem boost to the film’s protagonist, whom she encounters as a crying stranger on a subway platform: “Why he won’t try? Look at you with your pretty teeth and shit.” In Randall Park and Ali Wong’s Always Be My Maybe, released about a month later, Buteau played Veronica, the very pregnant and very funny assistant to Wong’s celebrity restaurateur, Sasha. If you’ve watched a Netflix original in the past few years, you might recognize the comedian Michelle Buteau as the platform’s punchiest voice of reason.
0 kommentar(er)
