Hug it Out, Bitch

I love Entourage, or Entourajjjj as Michael Scott calls it. In fact I think I relate to it more than anything else on television. I'd take it over Sopranos, Sex in the City or The Office in a second.

What's that? A 40-year old middle-class dad in Brooklyn relates to the Hollywood hipsters on Entourage? Are you insane? We all know I'm not from Holywood. Let me explain.

There's a lot going for Entourage. Last night's episode was the best yet. The cast is excellent; plenty has been written about Jeremy Piven but Kevin Dillon is gloriously over-the-top as Johnny Drama, Kevin Connolly is dead-on as Eric and who can resist Adrian Grenier's limpid pools? The cameos are entertaining and much better done than in season one, it's a great parody of celebrity culture, a window on behind-the-scenes Hollywood, the scripts are funny and the plot is engaging. There's lots of hot women, too.

But Entourage is really about stress.

Every episode is a pressure cooker, there are deals, deals within deals, competing agendas, a sense of having no idea what you are doing, a hostile outside world waiting for you to fail and often conspiring against you. The show is filled with ticking clocks, ticking clocks inside ticking clocks (a recent episode had a deal that had to be concluded by sundown but it was Yom Kippur and two Jewish characters had to walk between temples working it.). It's all contained within the giant ticking clock of Vincent's ephemeral career.

That's my fucking life. I rush everywhere to hurry up some more. Too much of my life is controlled by other people. I need a flow chart to keep track of the possibilities for my daughter's pre-K. My building is a money pit filled with neighbors who are always looking for ways to spend money. My life alternately goes in fast forward and slow motion and nobody totally gets it or can help me as much as I want. And there's not enough time to don everything much less do it right. I'm also the happiest I've ever been,
I just with I had an Ari Gold to make all my difficult phone calls for me.

Now I just have to hope my free HBO holds out (See? More stress!).