OH. MY. GOD.
I have just watched the first two episodes of Beef (which has been on my list for months and months because the first season was such excellent TV and I’ve been looking out for the next as soon as they announced it would be renewed. It’s totally unrelated to this season, and if you haven’t watched it you should! Excellent writing and performances).
This is the most EPIC trolling of Meghan Markle!! And it’s brazen and it’s fucking DELICIOUS!! I’ve thought about whether I’m looking for something that isn’t there because of these threads and the disproportionate interest I have in MM, but I’m definitely not. There are too many coincidences, too many details, just enough differences. Ooof - if this isn’t a lesson to not piss off or lord it over people who have done you a good deed/deal, I don’t know what is.
For those who don’t know, it’s a story about a British woman (Carey Mulligan) and her husband who are the interior designer for and GM (respectively) of a country club in Montecito. Never heard the town referenced in any American show before, and it’s not a slip - they’re referencing it to place the action immediately. First few seconds of the first episode and they name check it and follow up with a reference to Lucky’s, show the view, something else I’ve forgotten, and the camera pans over that classic Santa Barbara / faux Spanish whitewashed architecture and manicured lawns full of plastic shiny people all overlooking the Pacific Ocean at sunset. You know exactly what you’re going to get (if you’re familiar with California) straight away.
The story quickly unfolds: on the surface the couple seem in love and happily working together. Behind closed doors their marriage is falling apart, they’re fighting and arguing and telling each other they hate each other etc etc. She’s egging him on to do more and be more after things go south for her career-wise, berating him for having let her down and given up on their dream. He’s plodding along quite unambitiously, occasionally getting high, hanging out with people he can’t afford to hang out with and getting into debt thinking they’re friends and he can keep up with them etc. More story, other characters emerge and these two turn out to be lying grifters and scammers, in a seedy world full of lying grifters and scammers surrounded by rich people with actual money who are arrogant and obnoxious and snooty but who have actual wealth and who Carey and her DH desperately love/hate.
I won’t go into more as don’t want to spoil it, and I’ve only watched the first two episodes so it could all change and come good for Varey’s character - but MY GOD!! The BALLS on Sarandos to invite MM and Harry to the cast party last week, to which she AND ONLY SHE turned up wearing chartreuse like Carey Mulligan 😂🤣😂🤣. This is trolling on a scale normally reserved for rappers with, well, beef with each other (god this is so good!) but hats off to Sarandos and his wife!! This is an absolutely top notch “fuck you” from Netflix in the form of a glossy and beautifully observed and written piece of comedic fiction. Like, they’ve gone out of their way and put actual effort and money into setting her up. I’m sure it wasn’t the purpose of the show, it’s excellent without any of these allusions - I think it’ll end up being an acute observation of the fakery of Californian high society - and totally stands on its own. But that just makes this all the more clever. This is pure 👌. I just bet Sarandos suggested inviting Meghan to that party with a “shall we?? Is it too obvious? Is it too much?” and then deciding to fuck it and decide what goes around comes around. Hahahaha!!