Lessons in Chemistry
Cast & Crew
Matt Roush says...
The lovely adaptation of Bonnie Garmus’ best-selling novel dropped its series finale just before Thanksgiving, but it’s hard to imagine a better way to enjoy leftovers than indulging a full binge of this terrific eight-part period tragicomedy about a fictional TV chef who’s part Julia Child, part Marie Curie. Brie Larson is marvelous as Elizabeth Zott, a brilliant ahead-of-her-1950s-times chemist who channels her passion for science into cooking when her career is blocked, finding a rapt audience for her recipes on TV. The finale goes full Dickens (a nod to Great Expectations) as Elizabeth and daughter Mad (Alice Halsey) finally resolve the mystery of the late Calvin Evans’ (Lewis Pullman) tangled family ties. And Elizabeth makes a decision regarding the future of her Dinner at Six TV show, leaning on her life philosophy, on or off screen: “The only constant variable in a chemical reaction is change.”