Prime Video Dance Drama never flees
Light years away from Stars Hollow and the comedy clubs of the 1950s New York City, Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino’s newest Dramedy, “Étoile”, dives into the environment of professional ballet. The series highlights the Metropolitan Ballet Theater of New York City, run by executive director Jack McMillan (Luke Kirby) and Le Ballet National of Paris, managed by interim director Geneviève Lavigne (Charlotte Gainsbourg). In the midst of slow ticket sales, a post-known dancer Exodus and a shrinking audience, Jack and Geneviève come up with an ambitious plan to exchange their top performers more visibility for both companies for a year. Although dancing is amazing and some characters have a few funny features, “Étoile” is an exhausting show that is obsessed with a whole series of unbearable people obsessed by hearing themselves speaking.
‘Étoile’, who refers to the most important dancer of a company, opens as a young girl, Susu Li (Lamay Zhang), only dances in the dark rehearsal room in the Metropolitan Ballet. Elsewhere, in a nightclub in Manhattan, Jack and Geneviève party in an attempt to de -stress prior to their upcoming meeting. The next day, despite the festivities of the previous evening, Jack is not entirely on board when Geneviève presents her idea to trade their greatest talents. It is a bid bankrolled by the bizarre millionaire Crispin Shamblee (Simon Callow), who despises Jack. The MBT director, however, changes ideas after he has convinced his Paris colleague to borrow her most renowned (and difficult) Étoile, Cheyenne Toussant (Lou de Laâge). From there, the couple to prepare for the coming dance season while the newly exchanged dancers try to find safe spaces in unknown environments.
The Palladinos are known for overflowing scripts and a quick-fire dialog in “Gilmore Girls” and the Emmy-winning “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”, shown here in English and French. While Speedy Banter works for those who are sympathetic, Jack, Geneviève and Cheyenne are such raspersonality that the entire series feels awkward, as if the audience in this world is being held hostage instead of welcoming it. Moreover, the structure of the eight episodes is bizarre. Instead of a seamless season, the story works like two different acts. The end of episode 4 could easily have been the stopping point. The remaining episodes feel even more madness than the previous ones and introduce random characters, not convincing love affairs (past and present) and storylines that appear from nothing. Instead of being folded in the general story, the second half of the season feels like a side issue – or another series completely.
In the meantime, the few pleasant figures remain in “Étoile” on the edge. Mishi Duplessis (Taïs Vinolo), a ballerina that was previously started from Le Ballet National by Geneviève and then dragged back into the exchange, has the most digestible bow. In Vinolo’s Mishi, viewers meet a young woman whose existence revolves around ballet and who wants to deeply discover who she is outside of dance and away from the stifling presence of her prospective mother. Just like Mishi, Tobias Bell (Gideon Glick) is also fascinating. An eccentric, headphones-obsessed choreographer sent to France against his will and without his cherished crest toothpaste, he moves to the rhythm of his own drum and is one of the only real pleasures of the series.
So majestic and graceful as a ballet is missing “Étoile”. The show jumps so ominously disagreement between New York and France and presents annoying people who like to scream against each other. Although the Palladinos try to humanize the main characters by offering a glimpse of their personal lives, there are not enough reasonable interactions to promote real connections. While “Gilmore Girls” and “Mrs. Maisel” fascinate the audience, “Étoile” never reaches such heights.
The eight episodes of “Étoile” premiere on 24 April on Prime Video.
