Baskets: A Weird and Wonderful Show

Baskets, currently in its 3rd season on FX (Tuesdays, 10pm EST), is one of the strangest and most delightful shows to come around in a very long time.  Starring Zach Galifianakis as twins Chip and Dale (yes, like the Disney chipmunks), it's a show that is played straight but is in actuality laugh-out-loud hilarious.  Chip is a struggling rodeo clown, an irresponsible louse who can't seem to get his life together.  He's a graduate of a French clown/mime school, and his French wife lives nearby but only uses him for money and American citizenship.  Dale is the former dean of a career college, who in season 2 begins to lose control of his life as well when the college shuts down and his wife leaves him.  Chip's sidekick is Martha (Martha Kelly), a strange loner who becomes attached to Chip after working on his insurance claim when he crashes his scooter.  She's an insurance adjuster at Costco (that's a thing?), and she's been wearing a cast on her arm for 3 seasons now (this is never explained).  She's quietly infatuated with Chip, but he only uses her for rides around town. 

The real revelation of this show, however, is Chip's mom Christine, played by Louie Anderson.  Yes, you read that right.  A large male comedian is playing the mother of Zach Galifianakis.  Christine is a lonely widow, who fills her time shopping at her beloved Costco and doting on her sons (also including her rarely-seen twin adopted sons Cody and Logan, who are both famous DJ's that travel the world together).  Christine is proud of Cody and Logan's success but highly disappointed in Chip and Dale.  In season 2 she begins a long-distance romance with Ken "the Carpet King" and eventually buys the rodeo where Chip once worked.  Until watching the show, you would never guess that Anderson would be so believable as a woman.  The character is sweet and naïve, but at the same time a bit brash and controlling over her sons.  We feel for Christine when she is ashamed of her body during water aerobics class, and we cheer for her when she flies to Denver on a whim and surprises the "Carpet King", whom she had met before when his daughter and Chip ended up in jail together.  The character of Christine is vivid and real, like your favorite aunt or a memorable acquaintance from church.  It also helps that the makeup and wigs worn by Anderson have become much more believable since the somewhat crazy drag-ish looks of season 1.  Most importantly, though, Christine is very funny.  My favorite scene of the series is still Christine joyfully walking through Costco, making corny jokes with the staff and eating free samples.  Anderson rightly won an Emmy for the role after season 1.  Hopefully this character will live on for many seasons to come.

Besides Anderson, the rest of the cast is pretty terrific too.  Helped by the smart deadpan writing, Galifianakis gives Chip and Dale a manic energy that clashes hilariously with Martha's dull, motionless sarcasm.  In season 3, the Baskets Family Rodeo is taking center stage.  It remains to be seen if this plot shift will negatively affect the show, but with these skilled actors and writers at the reigns I have high hopes.