It has a stellar cast including Keegan-Michael Key, Cecily Strong, Kristin Chenoweth and Alan Cumming. But sadly, Apple TV+’s Brigadoon parody is lacking in every other way
What would you think if I told you there was a new show on Apple TV+ called Schmigadoon! (exclamation mark theirs)? If you were very young, I suppose you might think I were sneezing. If you were a Victoria Wood devotee, you might be reminded of the middle-aged women in the coffee shop sketch (“Did you go and see Macbeth?” “Mmm. Wasn’t a patch on Brigadoon”). And if you were slightly older and/or a fan of golden age musicals, you might think you were in for a loving, riotous pastiche of those happy days, an oblique run at the great American songbook, and perhaps a few heartfelt sighs over the memory of Gene Kelly (and his bottom, which should always have got separate billing) and Cyd Charisse (and her legs, ditto, although they did get their dues at the time) giving it their perfect all in the 1954 film adaptation of Lerner and Loewe’s stage hit.
Schmigadoon! gives a modern spin to the Brigadoon story by sending stuck-in-a-rut couple Melissa (Cecily Strong) and Josh (Keegan-Michael Key) on a therapy weekend, during which they have to go on a bonding hike through the woods. Deep in the forest, they cross a bridge and find themselves in a 1940s-style small town – laid on, they assume, as a therapy tourist attraction – in which the inhabitants break into song-and-dance routines at the drop of a rucksack. Melissa is delighted. Josh less so. (If you side with Josh, I would query what you’re doing watching something called Schmigadoon! in the first place. We’ll proceed from here, in the interests of fairness, as if only those not predisposed to hate it are present.) Neither of them seem particularly fazed by the discovery towards the end of the first episode – via Martin Short as a Finian’s Rainbow-esque leprechaun – that they cannot cross back over the bridge and leave the town without their true loves. Which do not seem to be each other. So they must stay, and become increasingly embroiled in the lives of the good – and less good – citizens of Schmigadoon while they work out what to do.
