Party Down

So remember yesterday when I said one of the shows I was planning to watch this summer was Party Down, and I said it in a way that suggested it was going to take up a lot of time and require some significant viewing investment?

Between writing that blog post and writing this one, I watched twelve episodes of Party Down. Yeah.

I would have watched the show much earlier if I’d realized that it’s made up of essentially the entire cast of Veronica Mars, plus most of its writers, plus Jane Lynch. I also would have watched the show earlier if I’d realized how funny the premise could actually be – the main characters are a group of caterers, and each episode features them working a different event. These range from standard parties like weddings, silent auctions, and backstage parties to more unusual affairs, like an adult entertainment awards show. The show takes place in Los Angeles, and the catering staff is made up of wannabe actors, comedians, and writers whose job forces them into daily contact with the people they so desperately want to become. Everyone wants to become famous, that is, except for the main character Henry, who actually had a breakthrough acting job as a tagline guy on a beer commercial and has since abandoned any hope of a further career.

Adam Scott as Henry on Party Down

It would be easy for Henry and his merry band of misfits to look unrelentingly jaded, but the whole thing is improved by the presence of Jane Lynch’s character Constance, who sincerely loves every party she’s attending. She claps with more enthusiasm than the weary guests at fundraisers, she is thrilled by surprise guest appearances, she is overcome by the dénouement of a sweet sixteen party. Balancing Constance’s dedication, Party Down Team Leader Ron Donald sees each event as a stepping stone toward his ultimate goal as franchise owner of a Soup ‘er Crackers buffet, and his repeated insistence on professionalism is matched only by his deeply-held self-doubt. As a result, the show takes on the quality of a Christopher Guest movie, where everyone approaches each event at a completely different angle of earnestness and someone is always dropping a tray full of appetizers.

Jane Lynch as Constance

The other sustaining force of the show is the whole caterer premise, which allows each episode to bring in a new cast of guest stars and forces the staff to deal with a new bunch of completely crazy, slightly famous people. In this way, Party Down is like an inversion of HBO’s Entourage, a show it references in the second season as Roman and Kyle debate which of them would be Turtle and which would be E. (Kyle insists, of course, that he’s actually the Vince of the group.) It is the same formula of a group of people striving for success in Hollywood, but has a much funnier and more clear-eyed perspective on what these people are trying for so badly, and how much more unlikely it is for them to achieve anything.

Slingin' 'derves at the Brandix Corporate Retreat

From a structural standpoint, I love the concept of each episode being a different party. It gives each episode an easy shape and purpose, but it also lets every episode have a completely different tone. That conceit prevents Party Down from ever being predictable, but in addition, a show that is so breezily comfortable at both a twenty-year high school reunion and a hard-core metal backstage party has to also have a pretty solid sense of itself.

Shame on me for letting this show slip through the cracks for so long.