The 'Russian Doll' Season 1 Trailer Is The Dark Comedy You Didn't Know You Needed
The end of the decade may feel like one long dark comedy, but when it comes to TV trying to make a show full of black humor to match, the best ones are usually an accident of timing. Deliberately planned ones, like the Heathers reboot or Maniac, wind up being as polarizing as the era itself. But the latest show from Netflix, Russian Doll, might just take the cake for the quirkiest and darkest comedy of the year, and it's only January. The Russian Doll Season 1 trailer is a cavalcade of drugs, drinking, and most importantly, death. And yet, it looks like the sort of thing worth watching for the laugh-out-loud moments.
The show comes courtesy of three of the funniest ladies working today, Amy Poehler (Parks & Rec), Leslye Headland (Bachelorette), and Natasha Lyonne (Orange Is The New Black). Poehler and Headland wrote the series, in which Lyonne stars as Nadia, a woman who takes herself to a party one night, only to become stuck there, Groundhog Day style.
Except, this is not living the same day over and over again, as Nadia never wakes up in the morning, nor does she make it to bed. In fact, she never makes it home from the party in the first place. Instead, she dies, in increasingly hilarious and bizarre ways, each time resetting back in the bathroom where she pepped talked herself into going into the party in the first place.
Check out the trailer.
Here's Netflix's official synopsis:
Russian Doll follows a young woman named Nadia (Natasha Lyonne) on her journey as the guest of honor at a seemingly inescapable party one night in New York City.
The eight-episode series co-stars Greta Lee (Inside Amy Schumer), Yul Vazquez (Midnight, Texas), Elizabeth Ashley (Evening Shade), Rebecca Henderson (Westworld) and Charlie Barnett (Chicago Fire).
Netflix trumpets this as an all-female comedy. This is not just because of the producing team of Lyonne, Poehler, and Headland, but because it has an all-female directing team, too. Lyonne and Headland both helm episodes, as does Jamie Babbit, known for films like But I'm A Cheerleader.
The twist at the end of the trailer is perhaps the most intriguing part. After night after night dying in every way possible at this party, or on the way home from it, Nadia finds herself in the elevator with a charming dude who seems wholly resigned to the two of them crashing to their deaths, because this is his life, too.
New York City is totally a place where you can find another member of your social cohort, no matter how offbeat your interests or lifestyle might be. But, let's be real, "dies every night only to find themselves stuck in a time loop" is a pretty rare breed. Especially since one is stuck in one's own time loop, finding someone else also stuck in a time loop and having those loops cross... It's practically a miracle.
I think I might need these two to become firm friends, stat. Russian Doll drops all eight episodes on Netflix on Friday, Feb. 1, 2019.
