Weeds: The Television Show
One American comedy-drama that has been making a hit recently is the popularly known show “Weeds”. This show is created by Lionsgate television under the supervision of a woman called “Jenji Kohan”.
The plot of Weeds mainly involves a housewife who has been widowed and thus must find a way to make money. She lives in an affluent California suburb and basically becomes the neighborhood drug dealer selling marijuana in order to earn her income.
The TV series name, Weeds, seems to refer both to the plant that the protagonist sells (marijuana) as well as widow’s weeds which is what one would wear when one’s husband dies and becomes a widow. Additionally, it may refer to American suburbs which grow quickly like weeds and contain many people who are indistinguishable; just like weeds.
The theme for the series which begins at the opening of each show is “Little Boxes”, a song that stresses the sameness of suburban life and is a very nice song to be used for this series that involves that aspect of suburban culture.
Weeds currently has five seasons and began to play in 2005. It was the highest rated series for Showtime in its first year and has been considered a definite success for the channel. On average, the season has attracted 962,000 viewers.
A total of 1.7 million viewers which is made up of 1.2 million viewers for the beginning and an additional .5 million viewers later for the rerun later that night mean that Showtime was quite happy with the success bringing in 1.7 million people to watch Weeds.
The show’s exterior shots and many other shots are taken in places in California like Calabasa and Santa Clarita Valley.
Nancy Botwin is the main protagonist who is the houselife living the typical suburban lifestyle in America until her husband dies and she must find a way to make ends meet. This leads her to the marijuana business where she begins selling to people like her accountant, lawyer and neighborhood friends. Eventually she must continue on to expand her customer base which brings about more obstacles for her throughout the show.
Celia is Nancy’s enemy but also her best first. She is in a marriage that is not very happy and abuses many vices like alcohol and attacking people in order to teach them lessons. Her character is an interesting one due to the friend/enemy like aspect she has in relation to Nancy.
Weeds’ Season 1 begins with Nancy’s husband dying which is the catalyst for the basis of the show which involves Nancy entering the marijuana dealings to keep her affluent suburban life alive.
Both of Nancy’s children attend public school but for Nancy to live and keep going on in her upper middle class lifestyle, she has to make ends meet and this involves her entrance to the marijuana market when she begins to sell to her friends and neighbors.
When some customers of Nancy’s begin to go to a marijuana dispensary, Nancy is forced to become innovative and thus uses her baking skills to make delicious baked goods in order to sell her inferior marijuana. She later goes on to open a bakery as a cover up. She buys baked goods from Costco and puts them on the shelves as her own in order to cover this up.
Weeds is a very good television show and if the plot and characters seems like something that you might like, you should definitely check out Showtime and see the show for yourself. If you cannot watch it right now, you can at least look at the clips and other videos online about the show by searching for “Weeds” in any search engine.