My overall impression
This is a funny show built out of a series of skits going in chronological from Shakespeare to the current era, for the most part satirizing the trials and tribulations of the creative class (writers and/or actors). The relatively large cast are all talented and move from scene to scene with energy and aplomb. All get their moment to shine in one skit or another.
The humor is often derived from juxtaposing modern practices with a past era. So Shakespeare has to deal with a focus group and Walt Whitman with spit-balling book agents. So really the satire isn’t of Shakespeare or Edgar Allen Poe but really using the greats to indirectly show the idiocy of the modern movie business. However the two most original, and to me the best of the bunch, are more in the realm of true parody. These are the last two play-lets: a quasi musical “love story” between J Edgar Hoover and a surprising antagonist. And the piece d’resistance: a pitch perfect conflict among second graders done in the style of David Mamet.
