What gripped me about this show was the authenticity and three-dimensionality of _all_ of HUFF's characters. No one-note stereotypes. Conflicted. Mixing irritating irrationality and perversity with endearing and respectworthy qualities.
I _cared_ about these people!! I wanted to know more about them, and what happened to them next.
Their lives were a revelation to me. Probably, for artistic license, each individual character was packed with somewhat more complexity than any one person you'd usually come across in daily life. But for me, that was a bonus.
Finding ways to "decode" others' behavior and internal workings has always been an urgent need in my several decades of life beleaguered with Attention Deficit Disorder (especially long before ADD was "discovered" and validated). Thus, for me the show has provided not only engaging entertainment but also an education in some of the many conditions the fellow humans I meet may be living through.
For this I want to especially praise Andy Comeau. For me his contribution is the most significant in the show. Through insight and skill he managed to convey the _humanness_ of a character the average viewer would see only as "some kinda nut".
Huff's brother Teddy is one of the few in the show identified with a specific mental disorder in his case, schizophrenia. Comeau acquaints us (superbly!) with not only the dysfunctionality but more importantly,I think additionally with the _normality_ and _commonality_ that is ALSO part of Teddy's makeup.
He shows that Teddy is not "merely a nut case" but is also _a human being_. Like we ALL are, in one way or another -- as we can se, IF we care to LOOK.
Most people divide the world into two camps the normals (themselves and people they like) and the crazies (people they don't understand and therefore put down). Comeau's brilliant and sensitive performance helps us see that EVERYONE is a mixture of, or somewhere on a continuum between, these two endpoints.
When more people understand that, the world will be a much better place -- for ALL of us.
I _cared_ about these people!! I wanted to know more about them, and what happened to them next.
Their lives were a revelation to me. Probably, for artistic license, each individual character was packed with somewhat more complexity than any one person you'd usually come across in daily life. But for me, that was a bonus.
Finding ways to "decode" others' behavior and internal workings has always been an urgent need in my several decades of life beleaguered with Attention Deficit Disorder (especially long before ADD was "discovered" and validated). Thus, for me the show has provided not only engaging entertainment but also an education in some of the many conditions the fellow humans I meet may be living through.
For this I want to especially praise Andy Comeau. For me his contribution is the most significant in the show. Through insight and skill he managed to convey the _humanness_ of a character the average viewer would see only as "some kinda nut".
Huff's brother Teddy is one of the few in the show identified with a specific mental disorder in his case, schizophrenia. Comeau acquaints us (superbly!) with not only the dysfunctionality but more importantly,I think additionally with the _normality_ and _commonality_ that is ALSO part of Teddy's makeup.
He shows that Teddy is not "merely a nut case" but is also _a human being_. Like we ALL are, in one way or another -- as we can se, IF we care to LOOK.
Most people divide the world into two camps the normals (themselves and people they like) and the crazies (people they don't understand and therefore put down). Comeau's brilliant and sensitive performance helps us see that EVERYONE is a mixture of, or somewhere on a continuum between, these two endpoints.
When more people understand that, the world will be a much better place -- for ALL of us.