What to Know
- Michael Douglas is also an Executive Producer.
- The show as created by Chuck Lorre.
- "The Kominsky Method" is available Nov. 16th on Netflix.
Not a lot of people would agree that getting old is funny. Sure, there are funny things that can happen, but mostly aging is a bummer. Comedy whiz and executive producer Chuck Lorre ("Big Bang Theory") has managed to find a way to make growing old gracefully a funny affair in his new Netflix show, "The Kominsky Method."
Academy Award winners Michael Douglas and Alan Arkin star in this eight-episode single camera comedy. Douglas plays Sandy Kominsky, an aging acting teacher and sometimes actor, who gives brilliant advice to his very green students. Arkin plays his long time agent and friend, Norman Newlander, who is acerbic and smart in all the ways we like Alan Arkin to be.
The two tackle life's inevitable curve balls as they navigate their later years in Los Angeles, a city that values youth and beauty. Both comedic and emotional, "The Kominksy Method" will probably play best in Los Angeles among actors and industry vets who are old enough to remember "Fatal Attraction."
The show is about "the industry" but it also goes deeper than that by addressing the challenges of getting older in any industry. LA is almost so hip that it's hard to imagine anyone over the age of 25 can survive here. Getting old is so not LA.
Douglas and Arkin play off of each other very well in this series that it almost seems like they've known each other for years. But in fact, they tell me the first time they met was over a lunch with Lorre, where both agree they were drawn to the writing and themes of the show and wanted to do it. What an LA thing to do. Turns out maybe getting older is hipper than we thought.
"The Kominksy Method" will be available Nov. 16 on Netflix.
