Dinner with the Parents is a comedy series based on the U.K.’s Channel 4 series Friday Night Dinner. The Freevee series was created by Jon Beckerman and produced by CBS Studios with Big Talk Studios. There are 10 episodes in total with a runtime of about 25-30 minutes.
Every Friday evening, the Langers gather for Dinner with the Parents, a chaotic and tumultuous family tradition. Despite their close bond, the family always ends up revealing their worst selves during these dinners. Usually, the menu includes lies, betrayals, pranks, schemes, unwelcome guests, childhood crushes, a potential felony, numerous bad choices, and a delicious apple crisp for dessert.
The cast of the series includes Michaela Watkins as Jane, Dan Bakkedahl as Harvey, Carol Kane as Rose/Nana, Henry Hall as David, Daniel Thrasher as Gregg, and Jon Glaser as Donnie. The guest stars also include Rob Delaney, Christine Adams, and Mircea Monroe as Amy.
Dinner with the Parents Review
Every episode of Dinner with the Parents starts with the eldest son of the Langers family, David (newly turned maths professor), driving up to his parent’s house for weekly Friday dinner. He is always wary of his surroundings and on his toes to spot his younger prankster brother, Gregg. Unemployed, living with his parents and wanting to push his ‘Gregg X Gregg West’ music festival agenda – to whosoever with the money to write him a check. The brothers have a long tradition of pranking each other when they least expect it and David often tries to sneak up on Gregg but gets gobsmacked instead, most of the time.
Apart from them, there are ‘wannabe cool/friend-like parents’ Jane and Harvey. Jane has become a full-time homemaker after quitting her job as an elementary art teacher, and Harvey is a dentist but also part of a band with his fellow dentist friends. While they try to portray themselves as cool but are in fact, quite nosy and controlling of their sons’ lives. Like desperately trying to set David up with his high school crush and current neighbour, at every opportunity they get. Living along with them is a slightly crazy gran, Rose, who wouldn’t be seen without her vape and would clad herself in sparkly skirts & gowns, at any good moment.
Dinner with the Parents Episode 1 sets the base for season 1 and what we developments we can expect, in the next episodes. It starts with David visiting home to introduce his girlfriend to his parents. It is a big moment since it is the first time he will be bringing any girl home. David is portrayed as a big-time nerd, who has difficulty even chatting up with a girl casually. So for him to bring ‘Kristen’ home is unusual but also makes the Langers suspicious, when she doesn’t turn up with him.
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Despite being real and supposed to arrive at a later time, David is left in a pickle when Kristen breaks up with him on a video call. Desperate to avoid humiliation and years of teasing from his brother, David devises the age-old catastrophic plan – pay someone to act like his girlfriend. From having to cover up lies and masking nervousness, a friendly dinner turns into a disaster – with everyone at fault for the chaos. As you can imagine, the night ends with all the lies and misunderstandings thrown out in the open but with a happy resolution that only brings the family together.
Almost all the episodes follow the same pattern- everyone trying to set up David with a girl, Gregg finding new/illegal ways to make money, Jane wanting to have control over all the chaos, Harvey fueling more chaos by being too self-absorbed and Granny Rose doing something wacky, just for some fun in her mundane life. Also, cameo appearances from their divorced neighbour Donny and his dog, add on more madness.
Talking about comedy, one can say that it’s decent enough to watch with everyone. It doesn’t promise some big laughs but there are some fairly witty moments here and there. But the problem is that characters do not develop further from the caricature they have moulded in the initial episodes. Till Dinner with the Parents Episode 5, you get the exact idea and history of the characters. After that, you would expect something new to happen to them or the characters to change their ways – like David getting one decent girlfriend or Gregg getting any job, for the time being.
But they remain on a constant graph, repeating the same thing and ending on the same note, where they first started. The chaos never resolves or transforms into something good and that becomes boring, even a bit frustrating to watch. Even the comedy threshold seems to get lower in the latter half of the episodes. If you were a fan of Friday Night Dinner and anticipating to check out Dinner with the Parents, then hold/lower your expectations.
Individually, it’s a fairly entertaining show to tune into when you don’t want to think much about what to watch. However, in comparison, it doesn’t hold up to the standards. One of the surprising elements of the show was Daniel Thrasher as Gregg, having seen his comedy sketches on YouTube, it was weird/new to watch him play one consistent character in a TV show. Fortunately, he doesn’t let down and brings his best to the table. Along with him, Carol Kane as Rose is a hilarious delight to watch.
Rating: 2.5/5
Dinner with the Parents is available to watch on Amazon Freevee.
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