How It Feels To Be Filled with Secret Sounds
“We were in trouble. That’s usually where I become a nightmare, because at the moment I’m assured of cancellation, I just decide to make the show good, and then I just close up shop in terms of the collaboration.”
— Judd Apatow, commentary track to “Kim Kelly Is My Best Friend,” from Freaks and Geeks
I’ve been obsessed with the DVD set of Freaks and Geeks for months now. I never watched the show during its original run, confusing it in my mind with That 70’s Show, which I did watch once and hated. But my friend Bonnie sent me Freaks for my birthday and, after a few months, I finally opened the box and popped the first DVD into my laptop.
I was soon hooked. This was perhaps the best TV show I had ever seen. The writing and direction were outstanding. But what really stood out were the characters. These social misfits, they were all so REAL. I went to school with these people. I was one of them, in fact.
Where the hell was I when this came out? Why didn’t I ever watch it? Why didn’t NBC give the show more of a chance, the way they did with sleeper hits like Seinfeld? What kind of a God would allow a thing like this to happen?
But of course I know why the series was pulled. TV isn’t about art. It’s about money. Hell, ART is about money. People who have made something true to themselves, something great, seldom get the notice or appreciation they deserve. The money instead flows to crap like Dawson’s Creek. (OK, I admit I never watched that either, but I’m confident that it is no Freaks and Geeks, even if the two shows shared some writers and at least one cast member.)
Watching all of the episodes of Freaks and Geeks, and then watching all of the commentaries, has really honed my nascent theories about art, its appreciation and the creative process. Paul Feig, Judd Apatow and the writers knew they had created something very special. They’d been endowed with the kind of magic that is entrusted to an artist maybe once in their life, if that. Some people understood the greatness of their vision - NBC did air the pilot and agree to pick up the first half of the season - but it’s clear that, as 1999 rolled over to 2000, Apatow in particular was beginning to feel like he was shouting into the void. The series was canceled after less than a season.
The history - birth, life and death - of Freaks and Geeks is as poignant as the show itself. It’s especially so to me as 2008 rolls over to 2009. Anyone who’s been bored enough to read my previous blog knows that my 2008 began very badly with the death of my band’s guitarist. Dream was one of the most gifted artists I’d ever met. He was also tormented. I think that he knew he didn’t have much time left, and he spent the last couple of months of 2007 manically writing and recording music.
The songs from those last months, some of which appear on his Wiki, were obsessed with death and loss. But they were also a real leap forward artistically for Dream. “please just fucking tell me” is perhaps the most lyrically and rhythmically complex song Dream ever wrote. And “ginger girl has lived this day before,” which Dream wrote when his last girlfriend dumped him, contains his most direct and emotional vocal performance.
Faced with what he believed to be inevitable death, Dream went for it with his art, pushing himself to create something that would be his legacy. Similarly, Apatow, Feig, the writers and directors pushed themselves with later Freaks and Geeks episodes. Episodes like “The Little Things,” which contains the improbably touching, yet very funny, story of Seth Rogen’s character learning that his girlfriend is a hermaphrodite.
Luckily for us, Apatow and his minions survived the demise of Freaks and Geeks. From what I’ve read, nearly everyone on that show has done very well. Sadly, Dream could not escape the quicksand his life was becoming, and he leaves us with nothing but our fond memories of him and our speculations on what might have been.
I’ve thought a lot about the things Dream missed in 2008. I wish that he could have stuck around long enough to hear Skeletal Lamping, Of Montreal’s follow-up to his and my favorite album of 2007. I wish that he could have witnessed the dramatic election of Barack Obama. I’ll bet he would have been dancing in the street:
3 years ago
