Praise Be, Dan Levy Has A New TV Show
Dan Levy as Pastor Nicky. (Photo: Courtesy Netflix)
Six years after Schitt’s Creek ended, Dan Levy is back on TV.
This time around, Levy is taking his Emmy Award-winning comic talents into kooky crime thriller territory with his new Netflix show, Big Mistakes.
There’s a lot going on in Big Mistakes, which he co-created with Rachel Sennott (Shiva Baby, I Love L.A.), but here are the broad strokes. The eight-episode series centres on one New Jersey family’s unfortunate brush with its town’s gangland underbelly—and the bickering chaos that results from that cross-pollination.
Levy plays a church pastor named Nicky who, along with his sister Morgan (played by Taylor Ortega) gets tangled up with the criminal underworld after they’re caught shoplifting. There's blackmail and kidnapping, car chases and a secret love story (Levy's character has a boyfriend he hasn't told his family about).
Here’s what else you need to know about the crime caper, which is streaming on Netflix now.
It shares comic DNA with Schitt’s
In an interview with Netflix to promote the show, Levy shared that the series represents a comic “exploration of family.” And in that sense, it’s something like a continuation of the themes that made Schitt’s such a phenomenon. “I like to describe this show as kind of like a different book on the same shelf,” he said.
Like Schitt’s, the series also invests in the comic conflicts that arise from fraught sibling dynamics. “This is by no means a reflection of my own family dynamic," Levy explained, "but I think anyone who has a sibling understands how frustrating and also how funny that conflict can be.”
The cast has solid comic chops
Levy’s writing, which relies heavily on clever retorts and searing clapbacks, demands a practiced comic hand to execute. Just as Schitt’s drew on the substantial powers of Eugene Levy and the late, great Catherine O’Hara, Big Mistakes is also equipped with a big-gun comedic talent: Roseanne star Laurie Metcalf plays the family matriarch, Linda, a hardware store owner who decides to run for mayor.
The series also features up-and-coming coming Canadian talent: Toronto-born actor and comedian Jack Innanen plays the clingy boyfriend of Ortega's character. (Familiarize yourself with that name: Innanen recently told Entertainment Tonight that he's "had some... conversations" about appearing on the second season of Heated Rivalry.)
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Flannery Dean is a writer based in Hamilton, Ont. She’s written for The Narwhal, the Globe and Mail and The Guardian.
