"Clean Slate": Positive, clean, angst-free comedy about a trans woman, her ally dad, and her gay buddy in Alabama. Don't worry, there are still dicks

 

Clean Slate, on Amazon Prime, stars Laverne Cox of Orange is the New Black as  Desiree, a trans woman who returns to her small town in...ulp...Alabama.... after transitioning.  Alabama?  I was afraid to even drive through the state.   I'm going jump right into the deep end with Episode 1.5, where Desiree wants to go back to church. Whoa, someone's going to quote the Book of Leviticus

Back Story: Desiree was dumped by her boyfriend and lost her job as a gallery coordinator in NYC, so she moves back to Mobile, Alabama to stay with her best friend, the closeted Louis (DK Uzoukwou, who played a straight guy on Insecure, but may be gay in real life).

She hasn't seen her Dad Harry (George Wallace) for 17 years, and she hasn't told him that she is trans.  When she drops by, expecting angry reprisals, he is surprised for about 30 seconds, and then becomes a super-ally.  So their estrangement was all on her?

Rather elitist, Desiree looks down on heavily-tattooed ex-con Mack (Jay Wilkinson), who works at Dad's car wash, and rejects him when he asks for a date.  

Next door neighor Miguel (Philip Garcia, left) doesn't appear in this episode.

Scene 1: Dad comes down to breakfast to see Desiree ready for church.  "You're sure you want to go?  You hated it before?"  "I liked the music and the picnics.  It was the threat of eternal damnation I disliked."  She wants to go to support new choir director Louis.  A gay choir director in a fundamentalist Alabama church?  

Scene 2: The Slate Family Car Wash (clean slate, get it?), which also has a snack bar.  How long do these car washes take?

Mack and his totally nonchalant preteen daughter ("What's your pronoun sitch?") run the place on Sunday morning, but they wonder why, since almost everyone in small-town Alabama is in church at that time. 

At church, Desiree gets nervous, so she sits in the back row, and when the Preacher (Keith Arnold Bolden) asks for visitors to stand, she keeps still.  I always hate that part, too.  Ella (Telma Hopkins, whom I know from Gimme a Break) isn't having it, and drags her to the front row to sit with the Girlfriends of Grace.

They have a standard Black Church service, with everyone singing along to the hymn without checking the hymnal.

Scene 3: At the car wash, Mack's daughter wants to know why he never goes to church.  He explains that it's a con: when he was in prison, he had the choice of joining white supremacy gangs or hiding in the chapel, so he hid, and became so good at the con that they called him Reverend Mack.

Daughter suggests a nefarious scheme to get some cars into the car wash on Sunday morning.

Meanwhile, the church service ends. Choirmaster Louis tells Desiree that he had to turn his phone off after she recommeded going on Grindr, because it kept pinging: "Those dudes are thirsty!"  Boyfriend is up for a fun Sunday afternoon.

On the way out of the church, the Pastor hugs the women and shakes hands with the men -- and Desiree!  She and Girlfriend of Grace Ella are both mortified by the snub.

Scene 4: Desiree lying in bed, being depressed: 27 minutes of bliss followed by a transphobic snub.  Girl, if that's the worst you get at a fundamentalist church in Alabama.... wait, 27 minutes?  Or services took an hour and a half: 30 minutes for announcements and songs, 45 minutes for a hellfire sermon, and 15 minutes for the altar call.   Dad tries to convince her that it wasn't a snub, the Pastor doesn't hug women unless he knows that they'll be ok with it, but she insists: the Pastor thinks that she is a man.

Meanwhile, Ella and the other Girlfriends of Grace are squacking mad.  They discuss how to get back at the transphobic Pastor: maybe withhold the after-church food that they always provide. No pot roast, no lamb chops, no deviled eggs.  We never got food after the service.

And Choirmaster Louis can start a choir boycott.  Back story: Louis is Girlfriend of Grace Ella's son.

Louis doesn't want to do it, but Ella forces him, or she'll revoke her Amazon Prime password (product placement, just like in the old days when they stopped the story to drink Maxwell House Coffee).

Dad offers to go speak to the Pastor "man to man."

More after the break

"You're the Worst," Episode 5.6: Is Jimmy hooking up with his buddy? Is Rapper Sam still bi? Is Dax a gay porn star?

 

Recently American comedies have been breaking the longstanding rule that sitcom characters have to be nice, the sort of people you'd want to invite into your home in real life.  Of course, the British have been doing it for years, but in the U.S. it's so uncommon that it still comes as a jolt to see someone who isn't very likeable in a sitcom.

You're the Worst, on Hulu, warns you in advance. Jimmy and Gretchen (Chris Geere, Aya Cash) are horrible, amoral people who dislike each other (well, except in the bedroom) and pursue a five-season long romance culminating in a series-finale wedding.  The B-plots usually involve the marital squabbles of another amoral couple who dislike each other, Edgar and Lindsay (Desmin Borges, Kether Donohue).  

I already reviewed an episode where rapper Sam Dresden  gets cancelled for using the f*-word, but turns out to be ok with gay men -- they're good at sucking.  To see if he is still bisexual or straight-but-open-to-oral interests, I reviewed Episode 5.6,  "This Brief Fermata."  According to the Google AI, "A fermata is a musical symbol indicating that a note should be held longer than its normal duration."

Scene 1: Jimmy and Gretchen are planning the table seating for their wedding reception, but Paul, Allan McLeod, is too boring to be placed.  They deserve a break from the drudgery of planning the wedding.  Jimmy suggests Fuck Week, a week where they can have sex with whoever they want.  He is surprised that Gretchen is so quick to agree.  

Scene 2: Monday.  At her job at the public relations firm, Gretchen checks out the hunk bulges and butts.  Assistant Lindsay notes a problem with Rapper Sam, Brandon Mychal Smith: his new track is bad, "Vietnam bad."  

But Gretchen doesn't care: it's Fuck Week, so she and Lindsay can go "day dicking" like they used to, at the Museum of Tolerance and Barney's Beanery -- wait, the notorious "Fagots keep out" joint?

First she has to sign up the new guy, Nok Nok -- Lou Taylor Pucci, top photo.  She figures he's so spaced-out, he'll be easy to snare, but he wants to hear the full pitch -- "Strategy, targets, concept art."  Uh-oh, she'll have to do work instead of getting dick.

Scene 3: Tuesday: Gretchen and Jimmy eat Chinese food while watching Nok Nok's videos and trying to come up with a pitch.  Jimmy has lipstick on his collar -- he's already successfully gotten laid.  Wait -- Buddy Edgar brings him a drink and gazes lustfully, but Jimmy shakes his head. Did they have sex, or is Edgar offering?

Cut to Wednesday: Gretchen revealing her pitch to Nok Nok.  He doesn't like it: how about a hard-scrabble life?  He was on the street at age 15, and he's a single dad?  

Assistant Lindsay went out dicking yesterday, and she, too successfully got laid. By the way, Rapper Sam is angry because his new, terrible track hasn't seen any radio play yet.  But screw it: Gretchen is going to forget about work and get some dick.

Scene 4: Thursday.  Jimmy comes in with a hickey, having gotten laid again. Another lustful gaze from Buddy Edgar.  Are they going at it?  Gretchen is still working. 

More after the break. Caution: Explicit