This American Life In Pictures

In interest of full disclosure, I love This American Life. I don't just love This American Life -- I am The Simpsons Comic Book Guy for This American Life without the declaration of which are the Worst. Shows. Ever. (Not that I have a blind love for every story.) I lend people my CDs, send links to the shows online and recommend my favorite shows several times a week to different people. As football fans, music fans, TV show fans use their great love to define themselves – I am a This American Life fan.

So when I heard about the television version of This American Life which premieres this Thursday on Showtime, I admit to being a bit apprehensive. It's like seeing your favorite book being made into a movie. It almost never comes out well. And even with the film versions that you don't mind, there are always those little things that they changed or omitted that dig in and make you so itchy that you can't walk out content with the final product.

This American Life: The TV Series is so much better than I could have hoped for.

I was lucky enough to get the first four episodes at once, and the final two slightly later and I agree with Director Chris Wilcha's assessment that the shows just keep getting better as the season progresses. The pilot has two shows already familiar to TAL fans – Second Chance, the Brahmin Bull that was created from another beloved bull's DNA, and the Improv Everywhere "Best Gig Ever" prank on Ghosts of Pasha, a Vermont band playing their first series of gigs in New York City. Two stories that are certainly memorable on their own, and are only enhanced with the visuals that the television version brings. Second Chance, the bull which is talked about in the radio piece, becomes such an integral character in the TV piece. The performance footage of Ghosts of Pasha at the "Best Gig Ever" jolts the viewer with what it must have been like to be at the show with the band. And it makes the pain of Chris Partyka. their guitar player, so much more tangible as he describes how he spent most of his life avoiding confrontation so he wouldn't be made fun of. I think it was a smart move to start off the series with these two, patiently illustrating for the skeptics of how their worries are unwarranted.

The shows certainly loosen up as they go along, and the last two filmed – "My Way" and "Pandora's Box" – are probably the closet to what the radio show feels like. Yet all of them bring such a beauty to the screen. I particularly adore the Burbank senior citizen community that decides to shoot a short film to submit to Sundance in episode five. And episode three's story of a Utah artist that paints Biblical scenes with Jesus – all from bearded life models (a hard thing to find in non-bearded Mormon country) – and how that affects everyone even tangentially involved. The Wiener Circle piece from the last episode is such a glimpse into a disturbing relationship between some customers and servers at a hot dog stand that it will haunt you.

And honestly. How can you not love Joe in episode two? You will love Joe. If you do not love Joe, the boy who does not believe in love, well then, there is something wrong with you.

There's been a resurgence of documentary-ish shows today. And even with the quality of programs out there like Intervention and Addiction, they usually focus a light on a darker side of the human condition. Putting people in a bit of a fishbowl, with you on the other side of the television looking in. In the Ghost of Pasha story, the question is asked – "Given the choice between dreams and real life, what would you choose?" I think that question is subtly asked in each story, be it in the modified pig piece, the man who visits his wife in their mausoleum every other day for lunch, or the filmmaker who has filmed the volatile relationship of his mother and his step-father, learning so much more than he expected from just observing with a camera rather than jumping into each argument. Most of us probably live between the two, hoping that we get to float into more of our dreams while dealing with the gravity of real life. That's the thing about This American Life -- the very nature of the show, with the reporters being so integral to the storytelling, it draws you, the listener, the viewer, in. They make you reflect. They make you feel in a way that's so different than what's on television now.

So set your Tivos on Season Pass and settle in this Thursday when This American Life premieres at 10:30 p.m. on Showtime.

Read our interview with Director and Co-Executive Producer Chris Wilcha.


Check out the Showtime site for a sneak peek of what's to come this season and more.

Get a peek of the three – COUNT 'EM THREE – show trailers now at thisamericanlife.org

Plus, listen to the This American Life archive of shows.

2007-03-21