Mozart in the Jungle Returns to Amazon Next Month

Think of it as an early Christmas gift.  On December 23rd, Amazon will make all 10 episodes of its new series Mozart in the Jungle available for streaming.  The show, starring Gael Garcia Bernal, Saffron Burrows and Hannah Dunne, was part of the second slate of pilots premiered by Amazon earlier this year.  It was one of four proposed pilot that I enjoyed, the others including Transparent which is already streaming and was renewed for a second season (you can view my earlier comments here). You can still view the pilot for free at Amazon.  

Not everyone was impressed with the pilot.  Here is what New York magazine's Vulture page had to say:   

The idea of a show about the secretly debauched world of classical music is fantastic, and the dramatic potential within any rigidly stratified power structure (like a symphony) is tremendous. But Mozart’s going for comedy, and it doesn’t quite get there; the tone of the show just doesn’t make sense. A sequence about how different kinds of instrumentalists make for different kinds of sexual partners (percussionists have great rhythm, jazz musicians like “ensembles,” etc.) feels more like a bumper sticker come to life than an actual conversation anyone would ever have, and exchanges like, “Do your lips hurt after playing like that?” “They used to … but now they’re used to being abused” might as well be from an oboe-themed porno (The Big O-boe?). At one point, Hailey heads back to her massive warehouse apartment, where she discovers her roommate is mid-party. Of course everyone is a musician, and of course this devolves into a drinking game/spin the bottle/instrument-playing contest, and if there’s anything dumber-looking than fake oboe-playing, it’s fake flute-playing. Sorry, Mozart.

I am willing to see a few more episodes before I make a final decision on its merits.