Post by roverpup on Nov 29, 2020 5:00:45 GMT
We are really enjoying this miniseries "The Good Lord Bird".
Dan and I are both history nerds and have taken to watching Yale professor David Blight's university lectures on YouTube about the American Civil War. All are absolutely brilliant but especially so when he talked about John Brown.
That whetted our appetite to learn more about anything pertaining to John Brown and his legend.
And then my eye caught sight of the series "The Good Lord Bird" on Crave TV based on the 2013 novel by the same title by James McBride.
Produced by Ethan Hawke and Mark Richard, it has garnered a boatload of great reviews.
And it is very quirky, rather grim and bloody (centering around John Brown, would you expect anything else?) And surprisingly extremely funny.
It is also very thoughtful and quite topical when addressing social issues.
Ethan Hawke is expectedly excellent giving an intensely insane aura of a performance but also allowing enough humanity to peak through so that you see the frailty of the man as well.
All the supporting cast is top shelf but I have to point out especially the performance of the other star - the young actor Joshua Caleb Johnson, who plays the protagonist Henry (Henrietta) Shackleford, who is the person who tells the story.
We are just over half way through the series and tonight got a particular thrill to hear a community mentioned prominently in the episode that we are completely familiar with - Chatham Ontario! Chatham was one of the most famous ending points of the Underground Railroad and had (and has to this day) a substantial black community. I didn't know that John Brown met Harriet Tubman in Chatham!
I can't wait to see the rest of the episodes! Even knowing the historical aspect well, seeing it played out in this beautifully written series makes it spring to life. I know it will end poorly for JB, but still, to see it play out so poetically will be intriguing.
So if you enjoy historical fiction (that is quirky for sure!) I can't recommend this series enough. It's a real gem.
Dan and I are both history nerds and have taken to watching Yale professor David Blight's university lectures on YouTube about the American Civil War. All are absolutely brilliant but especially so when he talked about John Brown.
That whetted our appetite to learn more about anything pertaining to John Brown and his legend.
And then my eye caught sight of the series "The Good Lord Bird" on Crave TV based on the 2013 novel by the same title by James McBride.
Produced by Ethan Hawke and Mark Richard, it has garnered a boatload of great reviews.
And it is very quirky, rather grim and bloody (centering around John Brown, would you expect anything else?) And surprisingly extremely funny.
It is also very thoughtful and quite topical when addressing social issues.
Ethan Hawke is expectedly excellent giving an intensely insane aura of a performance but also allowing enough humanity to peak through so that you see the frailty of the man as well.
All the supporting cast is top shelf but I have to point out especially the performance of the other star - the young actor Joshua Caleb Johnson, who plays the protagonist Henry (Henrietta) Shackleford, who is the person who tells the story.
We are just over half way through the series and tonight got a particular thrill to hear a community mentioned prominently in the episode that we are completely familiar with - Chatham Ontario! Chatham was one of the most famous ending points of the Underground Railroad and had (and has to this day) a substantial black community. I didn't know that John Brown met Harriet Tubman in Chatham!
I can't wait to see the rest of the episodes! Even knowing the historical aspect well, seeing it played out in this beautifully written series makes it spring to life. I know it will end poorly for JB, but still, to see it play out so poetically will be intriguing.
So if you enjoy historical fiction (that is quirky for sure!) I can't recommend this series enough. It's a real gem.
