'Julia' Season 2 Overindulges a Bit, But We Still Love It
The phrase too much of a good thing came to mind while watching the second season premiere of Julia. The Max series about the rise of famed and beloved chef Julia Child was truly a delight in its first season, and so much of its creative success hinged on Sarah Lancashire’s performance as the treasured title character. Lancashire (Happy Valley) inhabited Child so fully, from her very specific accent, to the cadence of her speech to the absolute infectious joie de vivre in her interactions with others. But something is off in the second season premiere. Suddenly, Lancashire’s take on Child borders into caricature territory. The performance is too broad, and too over the top. That might also be because the first three episodes of the season separate all the characters.
Julia and her husband Paul (a lovely David Hyde Pierce) are in the French countryside with Simca (Isabella Rossellini), trying to finalize the recipes for their next cookbook. The two women cannot stop arguing. Simca is constantly frustrated by Julia’s willingness to tamper with authentic French cuisine. “We start cooking real food in the morning,” she tells Julia after one afternoon in the kitchen. Simca is also perhaps a little jealous of Julia’s fame. One character meets Simca, the co-author of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and asks Simca how she knows Julia.
Meanwhile, back in Boston, Alice Naman (Brittany Bradford) has hired a new director for Julia’s show, The French Chef. Rachel Bloom (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) joins the cast as Elaine Levitch, a hotshot CBS producer who brings new ideas and energy to WGBH. Russ Morash (Fran Kranz) is no longer the director of Julia’s show and is busy trying to become a documentarian with varying degrees of success. Julia’s best friend, Avis DeVoto (Bebe Neuwirth), is embarking on a new romance that literally allows her to let her hair down. Julia’s editor, Judith (Fionna Glascott), is still clashing with her increasingly fragile boss, Blanche Knopf (Judith Light). The show seems fractured, as so many of the character’s storylines are in their individual silos.
