It’s hard to describe the shaggy dog appeal of the HBO program “Flight of the Conchords” to someone who has never seen this comic serial about the adventures of two New Zealand musicians in downtown Manhattan.
(The second season — 10 half-hour episodes which were shown on HBO last winter — just came out on DVD.)
Recently, I screened a few of the season two episodes for visiting friends — two laughed almost continuously and the other two clearly didn’t care much for it (they were politely unenthusiastic).
The show was created by and stars Jemaine Clement (above left) and Bret McKenzie (above right) who play fictionalized versions of themselves. Clement and McKenzie have been performing a comic musical act they call “Flight of the Conchords” for more than a decade, starting in their native country. It was the buzz from U.S. comedy festivals and TV appearances by Jemaine and Bret that led HBO to produce a first batch of 12 episodes two years ago.
Although much of the musical material was written in New Zealand a decade ago, it’s a tribute to Clement and McKenzie’s skills as comedy writers that the tunes fit so seamlessly into stories that take place in New York City and seem so true to the lives of struggling young artists there. Each episode contains a musical number in which the “Conchords” escape into a fantasy world of endless romantic opportunities and commercial success.
The HBO series benefits almost as much as “Sex and the City” did from on-location filming that captures the spirit of the city. In the case of “Conchords, however, no one is buying Manolo Blahniks or spending weekends in the Hamptons — the show takes us into a much lower-rung New York City of shared dumpy apartments, crappy jobs taken to support artistic work, and a life lived so close to the financial edge that using a debit card to make a purchase for $2.79 can trigger an economic disaster.
“Conchords” gently satirizes the Manhattan music scene, with the two singer-songwriters landing gigs in the tiniest and most far-flung clubs and finding themselves the object of a female stalker who is their only real fan (comedienne Kristen Schaal who is brilliant the role of Mel). Their manager is a fellow New Zealander, Murray Hewitt (Rhys Darby), who works in the tiny N.Z. consulate and who appears to know nothing about the music business. One of the show’s running jokes — in seasons one and two — is the way that these folks from New Zealand come in at the very bottom of the vast New York City immigrant community (most people think they’re from Australia or England).
“Flight of the Conchords” is the sort of quirky comedy that sneaks up on a viewer — with some gags as broad as the side of a barn and others virtually subliminal (only to be be picked up in a second viewing). The mix of slapstick and sophistication — and the oddball musical numbers — sometimes recalls the Monty Python troupe. You definitely have to watch more than one episode to get on the show’s wavelength.
There has been no official word on a third season — HBO says it would like one, Bret and Jemaine say they’re not sure if they can come up with enough new musical material — but it would be a shame if such a terrific show died after only 22 episodes.
