Hearts of lightness. HBO: Claudette Barius
A little while ago, I mentioned one thing that’s bugged me all along about Entourage: the difficulty of telling whether Vince is actually supposed to be a good actor or not. Last night we finally got to see him on set, and it didn’t clear much up. On the one hand the script’s cues seem to be telling us that he’s an impassioned artist finally getting a meaty role. On the other hand, his conspicuously bad accent was distracting, and his weight-gain makeup, which made him look like he was suffering a bad allergic reaction, didn’t help. It was like watching a skit about a Spanish-language-TV actor who had gotten stung by the guy in the bee suit.
It looks like this season of Entourage is going to try to turn that bug into a feature, though. Correct me if you disagree, but it seems like we’re supposed to be in doubt as to whether Medellin is a good or a bad movie, if Vince is a good or bad actor, if he’s really a huge, deserving talent or if he, and we, have just been fooled by all the sycophants blowing smoke up his suddenly padded butt.
In any event, it’s good to see Vince working for a change, although the documentary-crew format was a little distracting to me. For starters, it made the episode seem compressed, like clips from a more-interesting season of Entourage. But I guess it’s in the spirit of Entourage–which has always been about the idea that an actor’s career is about what he does while he’s not on a movie set–that it should spend more time on Medellin’s postproduction than its production. And after half an hour of seeing Vince at work, I already want to see him go back to wasting his money on cars and girls, the things in life that really matter.
By the way: I don’t plan on doing morning-after John from Cincinnati wrap-ups, at least until we get beyond the three episodes I’ve already reviewed. But I’m interested in hearing any thoughts, if anyone out there is still watching. For instance: was it just me, or could you see Seanie’s miracle-resurrection coming miles in advance, like a tsunami on the horizon? Should we just bag both these shows and institute a Flight of the Conchords Watch?