SNAPSHOT
“Your mother needs a moment to herself.” Set in the early 1950s, Lessons in Chemistry follows Elizabeth Zott (played by Larson), whose dream of being a scientist is put on hold in a patriarchal society. When Elizabeth finds herself fired from her lab, she accepts a job as a host on a TV cooking show, and sets out to teach a nation of overlooked housewives — and the men who are suddenly listening in — a lot more than recipes. Lessons in Chemistry is a series created and written by acclaimed writer Susannah Grant (Party of Five, Erin Brockovich, Catch and Release, Charlotte’s Web, The Soloist, The 5th Wave, Unbelievable) … Based on the novel of the same name written by Bonnie Garmus. With episodes directed by Sarah Adina Smith (director of the films Buster’s Mal Heart, Birds of Paradise, The Drop). It’s executive produced by Lee Eisenberg, Susannah Grant, Brie Larson, Jason Bateman, Michael Costigan, Natalie Sandy, and Louise Shore. (courtesy First Showing)
It’s such a rare thing for anything to live up to the hype.
The book or movie or TV show or whatever may be a brilliant piece of work but when you crack open the novel or fire up your streaming service, you are already so weighed down by whatever you’ve been told is good about what you’re about to consume that it simply doesn’t stand a chance.
But, and thank the pop culture gods for that, there are exceptions to the rule, such as Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, a book which arrived in the first half of 2022 loaded with all kinds of expectation … and which delivered on every single count and then some.
It had a protagonist battling trenchant misogyny in the mid-twentieth century who was highly intelligent, whip-smart funny, who knew what she wanted and wasn’t afraid to say so and who refused to play by the rules set down by a patriarchal society.
That doesn’t mean she was a winner all the time, because she manifestly isn’t – where would be the truth if she was? The thing is, simply by being cleverly oppositional, she makes a huge and indelibly lasting mark on her own life, those of others and the world around her – but because she dares to try and is likably wonderful into the bargain (for the readers at least, not so much some of the characters).
So, it’s exciting to see how quickly the book has been adapted and that it stars no less than the superlative Brie Larson who will no doubt shine in the role of Elizabeth, a laudatory protagonist from one of the best novels of 2022 which, against all odds, exceeds the hype.
Here’s to the adaptation doing exactly the same!
Lessons in Chemistry begins screening on AppleTV+ sometime in the Northern Hemisphere autumn.