Laughing Together Through Heartbreak
Making a comedy about grief is no easy feat, but when you pair Ted Lasso masterminds Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein with Jason Segel and build an ensemble cast that includes Segel, Harrison Ford, Christa Miller, Jessica Williams, Luke Tennie, Michael Urie, Lukita Maxwell and Ted McGinley, it turns out to be a recipe for a heartwarming comedy that makes viewers laugh as much as it brings them to tears.
Shrinking, which is currently in its second season for Apple TV+ and produced by Warner Bros. Television, follows grieving therapist Jimmy Laird (Segel) who, after his wife is killed in a car accident, begins to break the rules of his profession and tell his patients exactly what he thinks. Ignoring his training and ethics, he finds himself making huge changes to people’s lives, as well as his own. As he attempts to navigate a world without his wife while raising a teenage daughter (played by Maxwell), Jimmy is forced to confront his own traumas and begin a journey of healing all while he continues to assist his own patients with their respective journeys.
AppleTV+
AppleTV+
But fortunately for Jimmy, he’s not alone: There are his nosy neighbors Liz (Miller) and Derek (McGinley) whose three sons have flown the nest; his therapist coworker Paul Rhodes, (Ford), who has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s; coworker and friend Gaby (Williams); his attorney best friend Brian (Urie); and his patient-turned-roommate Sean (Tennie), who suffers from PTSD from his military service. All of these characters help Jimmy carve the path to his new reality and reveal that, at its core, Shrinking is a story about family and taking care of the people you love.
“One of the things that I’ve always loved about comedy is that it actually lowers the defences to come in and talk about some real subjects,” Segel says. “It’s something Shrinking does really well. As opposed to a drama about grief where you go in knowing it’s going to be heavy and you have your walls up, Shrinking has big laughs and is super fun. It feels like your friends and your family, and it lets us do some dramatic work about grieving.”
The show is laden with Lawrence’s trademark sensibility of combining comedy and emotion and, thanks to these eight series regulars, it’s a show that dares to build a complex and nuanced structure of characters around Jimmy. “I’m so lucky to work on Shrinking with actors, writers and a crew so talented that they all elevate the material,” says Lawrence. “I’m even luckier that they are people I’d want to spend time with anyway.”
“We’re dealing with this really beautiful and heartbreaking storyline of Paul progressing with his Parkinson’s and Jimmy trying to be there for him and dealing with mortality,”
– JASON SEGEL
When it came to approaching the second season, Segel says: “We did a lot of thinking about what is as powerful a theme as grief, the next stage of how someone deals with loss in their life and what else these characters are going through. With forgiveness, there’s also a secondary idea of accountability and taking responsibility for yourself and for your mistakes. It seems there’s a wealth of material there for all of the characters to dig into.”
Indeed, each character has their own individual problems that they need to navigate. Paul, for instance, is increasingly faced with his own mortality as he struggles to cope with his Parkinson’s diagnosis while entering a new romantic relationship with Julie (Wendie Malick). Liz continues to fret about “having a purpose” after her boys have left for college. Brian struggles to confront whether or not he is ready to start a family with his new husband Charlie (Devin Kawaoka). As they face these issues, what becomes more and more apparent as these characters grow and evolve is that they are flawed but decent people who care greatly for those around them.
“We’re dealing with this really beautiful and heartbreaking storyline of Paul progressing with his Parkinson’s and Jimmy trying to be there for him and dealing with mortality,” says Segel. “It’s what I love about the show. It really has everything.”
AppleTV+
AppleTV+
Co-creator Goldstein agrees. “I loved writing season two,” he says. “It was a joy because you know the characters, you know the cast and you know how good they are. You know what they’re capable of and you can build the world out more.
“That has a lot to do with Bill Lawrence’s school of writing and how you build a show. It’s all from a place of love and it’s all of them wanting the best for each other. It’s much easier to help the ones you love than it is to help yourself and none of these people can really take their own advice, which is very relatable.”
