Should You Try To Make Friends With Difficult People?

What Is This Thing?

Manhattanites Julie Kessler and Billy Epstein are trying to break into show business, and can't appreciate the possibility that their failure to have done so already may be due to the fact that they're both...kind of hard to get along with. Fine: they're dicks.

When Is It On?

Whenever you want, kind of! Hulu is posting the first two episodes tomorrow; the rest will roll out once a week on Wednesdays.

Why Was It Made Now?

Originally, the show was developed for USA, back when it was trying harder to make its own original comedies. Since then, it's kind of inched away from that initiative (R.I.P. Sirens; keep on keepin' on, Playing House!), allowing Hulu to step into the breach.

What's Its Pedigree?

Julie Klausner (a recent voice performer on Bob's Burgers, formerly a producer on Best Week Ever and Billy On The Street, and -- full disclosure -- both a friend and, at one time, an editor reporting to me many jobs ago) and Billy Eichner (Parks & Recreation; titular host of Billy On The Street) play their semi-namesake characters; Klausner also created the show. James Urbaniak plays Julie's boyfriend Arthur; Andrea Martin plays her shrink mother; Gabourey Sidibe plays Denise, the owner of the restaurant where Billy waits tables. Guest stars in the first few episodes include Rachel Dratch, Beth Dover, Nate Corddry, Kate McKinnon, Andy Cohen, and John Benjamin Hickey -- and if you've ever wanted to see Dr. Frank Winter enthusiastically volunteer to assist Bridget Everett in a comedy bit or (badly) sing "Happy Birthday" to a stranger in a restaurant, your wait is over. And, as noted in the above-linked article about its original pickup, the show is produced by Amy Poehler, the power behind another acclaimed comedy about a pair of prickly New Yorkers, Broad City.

...And?

If you follow Klausner or Eichner on social media...well, you're already in the tank for this show, probably. But also, you will be delighted to see how closely their Difficult People doppelgängers hew to their online personae: I couldn't find proof that the controversial tweet in the series premiere was an actual @JulieKlausner classic, but it sure sounded like one, and it's nice to see that the basset hounds Klausner's real-life apartment won't allow her to get have been bestowed upon her DP counterpart. Similarly, Billy's blanket condemnation of all celebrities except Wendy Williams doesn't feel like much of a stretch for the fellow who, on last night's Watch What Happens Live!, had to end the segment with what certainly seemed to be a "which do I hate less?" stumper.

The fun of the show is that both these characters are absolutely shame-free in saying what the rest of us would only think and maybe mutter to our very best friends or save to discuss with our significant others on the car ride home. A mother taking her children to Annie on Broadway can, for instance, try to get Billy and Julie to quit lacing their disappointed yelps (about seeing the understudy) with loud profanity, but if she's going to phrase it as a question of whether they can keep their voices down, then she's going to leave Billy no choice but to inform her, gravely, that they actually can't. Julie legitimately thinks she's helping by telling Arthur's boss at PBS (Orange Is The New Black's Tracee Chimo) how to make pledge breaks less boring, not realizing that calling them boring might be considered rude. Is Billy wrong to dump an otherwise great guy because he's "a participator"? If you think that's a terrible decision, you are probably not in this show's target audience. When it comes to Difficult People, you definitely get what's on the tin.

...But?

I know she's an Oscar nominee and everything but I've never thought Gabourey Sidibe could act and I still don't. Fortunately, her role is relatively minor, and she actually has a pretty funny moment in the second episode involving a set of car keys, so I can even give her a pass.

...So?

It's been so long since I've had a chance to live vicariously through the utterly misanthropic monster Larry David on Curb Your Enthusiasm, and since we don't know for absolutely certain whether he'll be back even in 2017, Difficult People's two Larries are ably filling the gap.