Parks + Recreation, Ep. 14 "Leslie's House"

Tonight Leslie’s party featured fencing, juggling, five courses, and a first-class bartender. Factually, it was awesome. True, visitors were figuratively chased off by an accounting expert plying his trade¹, but even so her co-workers’ standard reaction of indifference simply didn’t fly with me. It's like they've perfected a unique form of apathy.²

I guess all I’m saying is that I would have liked a bigger win for Leslie and that on Parks + Rec that unique attitude of immovability should be confined to two characters. There’s Ron, who in many ways is a comic foil to offset Leslie’s eagerness... and April, who is a specific type of teenage girl, no additives or exaggeration necessary.

Still, at the start of the episode it would have been hard to imagine a party put on by Leslie winning even indifferent reviews from her co-workers. Now really starting to get into things with Justin, her object is to come up with a date idea that will impress a big-town lawyer played by Justin Theroux³. The thought to host a party comes to her rather, um, suddenly and it’s a minute before she realizes that she doesn’t know the interesting people she promised⁴  and that her house resembles that of a crazy cat lady. Enter B-plot thread laid down early in the episode.

In the past few weeks I feel that Parks has set its narrative wheels spinning harder (faster?) than usual in an effort to avoid the old pattern of Leslie getting in and out of trouble while Mark-Ann/April-Andy do something cute. “Leslie’s House” is evidence of that focus, as the almost clownish cold open of Leslie visiting the different free classes pays off later in the episode. Such screwball can-she-keep-all-the-balls-in-the-air-no-realistically-she probably-can’t antics are more sitcom-conventional than what P+R usually does⁵, but it seems fresh thanks to the character-based comedy surrounding it.


Basically the unifying feature of the activities at the party...

Episode Grade: A-

Standout Character: Justin

Standout Moment: "It helped your case that you called for this review yourself, and that you paid for it with your own money."- unnamed ethics judge, to Leslie.

Footnotes

1. And in a more literal sense by two on-duty cops.

2. The only place I have witnessed this very special ethos is a high school gym class. Only there do normal people so studiously avoid activities designed for their enjoyment (be it sports or top-notch knitting instruction).

3. Theroux, who is usually introduced to people in one of two ways: As an actor often typecast in roles in which women find him conventionally attractive (ie The Baxter and P+R). Or as a successful writer whose credits include Tropic Thunder and Iron Man 2. Yes, that’s right- this man is deliberately and systematically stealing my fantasy life. The only difference I've been able to find between him and future me is that I keep all of my hair.

4. Actually she never realizes this, but I realized it on her behalf pretty early on.

5. Think of your average episode of Frasier, or a good episode of Seinfeld.