There’s an exercise where you take an abstract scribble and transform it into a fully formed drawing. It’s hard not to think of that exercise when watching the Apple TV+ dramedy Ted Lasso.
The show, or at least its characters, started life as a series of NBC Sports promos starring Jason Sudekis, but those were mere abstract shapes compared to the fleshed out thing that they’ve evolved into.
Among the digerati, I’ve read more than once comments like these from Jason Kottke:
It’s ok if you don’t care for sports. It’s not about sports.
Assuming it was about sports kept me from watching it initially; when I finally succumbed I realized that, indeed, it’s not about sports, at least not in the sense that you have to be sporty to enjoy it. Which I do.
In this vein it’s not unlike Sports Night, the venerable Aaron Sorkin/Thomas Schlamme creation, from which the absence of a laugh track earned a New Yorker profile before it even debuted. Author Tad Friend wrote there:
The subject of sports isn’t particularly suited to a TV series, but likeable characters who like sports are.
The characters of Ted Lasso are exceedingly likeable, especially Sudekis, who, with his costar Brendan Hunt and two others, created the show. The original Ted Lasso, from the NBC Sports days, was all thinly drawn goofy parody; the Ted Lasso in the series is that, plus backstory, plus heart, plus metaphysics. He is the coach we all wished we once had.
This success of transforming a sketch into a work of art makes me think I should option the series rights for those old Peter Pan commercials.
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I am Peter Rukavina and this is my blog. I am a writer, letterpress printer, and a curious person.
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Comments
He is the coach we all wished
He is the coach we all wished we had. My sporty emotionally cautious 20 year old son could not keep the grin off his face. We loved it.
I'll have to give it a try.
I'll have to give it a try. The best non-sport sports show I ever watched is Friday Night Lights, which I avoided for years as friends claimed "It's NOT about football."
Same thing for me with Friday
Same thing for me with Friday Night Lights. I will seek it out.
We've watched the whole thing
We've watched the whole thing at least twice. Except for the season during the TV writers strike, it's stellar. In my all time top 5.
Andrea recommended Ted Lasso
Andrea recommended Ted Lasso to us and Dale and I both really enjoyed it. It was exactly what we needed to de-stress and unwind. I watched Friday Night Lights several years ago prior to Bailey starting to play football and enjoyed it as well. I would be interested in watching it again as a "football mom" (something I never imagined I would become).
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