Commentary

Show's Episodes Are 10 Minutes Long, But Seem Longer

The monotony of SundanceTV’s Monday lineup is to be broken up by a new show at 10 p.m. lasting just over 10 minutes.

Then it will be back to the channel's lineup of movies. Leading into this 10-plus-minute show, according to a schedule on SundanceTV.com: “When Harry Met Sally” (1989). After the show, at 10:13 p.m., “The Breakfast Club” (1985).

So here we are, having arrived at the moment in the evolution of television when a cable network develops a 10-episode series whose episodes will come and go in the proverbial blink of an eye, buried between old movies.

You've heard of the fragmentation of TV audiences? Well, now we have the fragmentation of TV shows. Submitted for your approval: This new Sundance series called “State of the Union,” which has nothing to do with politics or the President of the United States.

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Instead, the “Union” in the title is the rocky marriage of these two 40-plus-year-olds played by Chris O’Dowd and Rosamund Pike (seen in the photo above). Each episode of this very brief TV show (or at least the first three of them that the TV Blog watched last week in advance of the show's premiere) takes place in a pub across the street from the office of a marriage counselor who the couple is due to see in a few minutes.

Thus, we the audience get to eavesdrop on their pre-session conversations. And after we are done listening to them, it is possible we will never again strain our ears or twist our necks to eavesdrop on anyone else ever again.

This show is made in England. As a result, one of the sore spots in this couple's marriage -- other than her torrid affair with another woman -- is the husband's support of Brexit, something almost no one in America will identify with. This presents a problem because Brexit becomes part of their not-so-scintillating (to say the least) conversation in two episodes (Nos. 2 and 3) and possibly more.

Another conversation weighs the relative importance of a set of lost keys against a misplaced ballpoint pen. Unfortunately, however, the ballpoint pen throughout this conversation is referred as a “biro,” which is a British-ism for a ballpoint pen. I know this because I looked it up on Google. Note to U.S. TV networks airing unaltered English-made TV shows: It might be helpful to provide viewers, or maybe just TV critics, with some sort of glossary.

Needless to say, an entire conversation about an object almost no one in the viewing audience will recognize is something most TV shows aimed at an American audience should try to avoid.

With its conversations about pens and keys, the show plays like a diluted English “Seinfeld.” In the first episode, the two have a conversation comparing the pluses and minuses of two diseases -- ebola vs. cancer. The characters in “Seinfeld” never got around to this subject, but it sounds just like them. So does a conversation about “makeup sex,” which as a matter of fact, was a topic on “Seinfeld.”

Also not unlike American sitcoms, this comedy gets right into topics that are de rigueur on U.S. TV. Episode One opens with a discussion of “pee” and “poo.” Episode Two starts with a conversation about the O’Dowd character's “giant balls” -- and this conversation goes on and on and on.

And that's something you can say about this show in general. Each episode might be just 10 minutes long, but they seem much, much longer.

“State of the Union” premieres Monday (May 6) at 10 p.m. Eastern on SundanceTV.

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