Chuffed to see that Louie is back on the television in the UK. And even more chuffed to see that it starts with a truly great triple whammy - three episodes linked together like a comedy human centipede to make The Late Show Trilogy. You will laugh, you will watch through your fingers and by the end you will love the ginger schlump that is comedian Louis CK, currently also to be seen in the new Woody Allen movie, more than ever.
The plot is pretty simple. After storming it on Jay Leno's chat show our paunchy anti-hero is tipped the wink by studio bosses that David Letterman is quitting his talk slot at the end of the year and he has a shot at taking over. This, of course, is a dilemma on all sorts of levels. It involves losing weight, not seeing as much of his two kids and wearing a suit – three things he has difficulties with.
But after much thought he takes on the challenge and this is where the programme gets wonderfully weird. David Lynch suddenly turns up, as if direct From Blue Velvet, as mysterious monosyllabic producer Jack Dahl, who tutors Louie in the run-up to his try-out pilot. The clips of the immaculately coiffed Lynch have been knocking around YouTube for a while (see below) but it is infinitely better to see them in context, particularly his closing advice. Lynch is not the only weird thing about this episode though. Did I mention that Louie's agent looks about 13? No wonder that in the series he has not made it big yet.
Lynch is not the only showstopping superstar cameo here. Chris Rock pitches up, as does Jerry Seinfeld. The person that is missing, of course, is Garry Shandling. The shadow of The Larry Sanders Show hangs over the unfolding drama. As in Shandling's show we see behind the glittery curtain of US TV chat shows and witness the murky politics, ego and power plays that go on backstage and offscreen. It's a dirty, brutal world where they say you are brilliant and you get bumped, where your friends don't stab you in the back, they stab you in the front. The sitcom might be fiction but there is a lot of truth here too.
If the subject matter is familiar, the execution is utterly distinct. When Louie goes road-running and sparring to get in shape a lesser sitcom would have trotted out the Rocky theme. In truth things do get a little corny at times, but it always pulls back from the obvious. There is a melancholy tone here in the way Louie ends up chasing a dream that in some ways was never his dream in the first place.
We won't reveal the ending. Needless to say it is not a predictable one in some ways even if it is predictable in other ways. Who knows though. Maybe if his fictional agent didn't look as if he had to be in bed by 9pm on a school night Louie's career prospects might have turned out differently.
Louie, Thursdays, 10pm, Fox.
Watch David Lynch in Louie
