This post contains spoilers for episodes one and two of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season four.
Who says you can’t go home again? After two seasons of traveling on The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel—from Paris and the Catskills in season two to a doomed cross-country comedy tour in season three—Rachel Brosnahan’s Midge Maisel is back in the New York groove for season four. But her return to the Big Apple, which plays out in the season’s first two episodes (now available on Amazon), doesn’t come without its difficulties.
After nearly outing his sexuality, Midge has been booted as Shy Baldwin’s opening act and is suddenly strapped for cash. Despite some newfound notoriety, she’s also still barred from performing the kind of stand-up that, say, Lenny Bruce can get away with. (FYI: Luke Kirby’s irresistible take on the comedy giant is MIA from the season’s first two episodes.) Meanwhile, Alex Borstein’s Susie is living on borrowed time and money after gambling all of Midge’s earnings away, unbeknownst to her client. And the lovable, if boundary-less, Rose and Abe Weissman (Marin Hinkle and Tony Shalhoub) are making themselves more than at home in Midge’s cushy apartment.
Call it narrative kismet that Maisel’s hometown reset coincided with a pandemic that would’ve likely grounded production anyway. “It forced us to sort of recommit ourselves to New York and New York City as a character,” cocreator Daniel Palladino told Vanity Fair in a recent interview. The show also utilized theaters and comedy clubs that lay dormant during lockdown. “We got to spread all our money around New York, and we were really happy with that,” Palladino said. “There were a lot of really happy people running these sites, very happy to have us in there to tide them over till they could bring people, an audience, back in.”
Amazon announced this week that The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel will end in a tight five—seasons, that is. During our chat, cocreator Amy Sherman-Palladino (she and Daniel are both longtime collaborators and real-life partners) had hinted that the end was near. “Well, my arm hurts, and I have a neck issue, and my feet are f*cked up,” she declared when asked if the fourth season would be Maisel’s last. “I’m thinking it’s going to be time to put me down soon, so it might end there. It might end with me and some propofol because I’m falling apart. I’m physically just a hot mess. I think that’s what we’re telling Amazon.”
Speaking to Vanity Fair, the Palladinos bantered back and forth about the first two installments of season four—including the show’s new weekly release schedule, Susie’s shielded sexuality, and why they’ll always root for the oft-debated character of Joel.
Vanity Fair: In seasons two and three, there was lots of travel. Given that filming happened mid-pandemic, was it a relief that Midge was going to be more homebound this season?
Daniel Palladino: Well, they go to Coney Island.
Amy Sherman-Palladino: With traffic, that could be hours.
Very true.
Sherman-Palladino: At first, it was a little like, Oh geez, we always go somewhere. We didn’t want to do the show and have it be a show that people went, “Well, it was during the pandemic, so let’s give them a pass.” We wanted the show to still feel like the show. We were a little concerned about the aspect of not being able to go out and go somewhere. It actually turned out to be kind of a great thing for us.
Palladino: Yeah, we were nervous as to whether New York locations were going to be willing to let a crew in during COVID. But our crews, with the testing and everything, are safer than a lot of people just walking.
Sherman-Palladino: Yeah, the safest place to be in New York during that time was on the Maisel crew.
Palladino: We got into a lot of clubs and a lot of arts facilities that were closed and really needed the money, and they were very happy to see us. On the contrary, a lot of places were open to us. [Although] we had to deal with outside restaurant sheds, which did not exist in 1960. We actually tore one down and rebuilt it after filming. Those are kind of the bane of our existence now, because that takes up so much street.
