From the very first episode, Netflix‘s historical romp The Decameron is a solid gold comedy banger. None of this “give it three episodes to get going” nonsense; Kathleen Jordan’s highly entertaining, luxuriously produced comedy might be “loosely based” on Giovanni Boccaccio’s hefty 14th century book, but with some superlative writing she has made it entirely her own.
It’s 1348 and the Black Death is ravaging Italy. The canals of Firenze overflow with sore-covered corpses and the nobility are fleeing the city in the hope of outrunning death. A group of posh knobs and their servants arrive at a remote country villa for two weeks of indulgence while the plague does its worst outside the gates.
Like every good houseshare comedy (think Ghosts or Father Ted), this assortment of flawed characters, most harbouring secrets, are forced to share the same space as the fabric of their miniature society crumbles. It’s The White Lotus in jerkins with a much higher body count.
While the writing gleams like a new blade, the cast is also pretty dazzling. Zosia Mamet from Girls and Veep‘s Tony Hale are arguably the two biggest names on the ticket (perhaps just because they are American), but they’re ably supported by Saoirse-Monica Jackson (Erin in Derry Girls) and the quite outstanding Tanya Reynolds from Sex Education.
It is perhaps pointless to pick favourites when the quality of the cast is this high, but Reynolds steals almost every scene she’s in. Pity the other faces who share the screen with her because you’ll struggle to look anywhere else – her enormous, expressive eyes and long neck give her the appearance of a hyper-vigilant goose (and I do mean that in a good way). She’s fantastic.
At first, we see villa life through the eyes of put-upon servant, Licisca (Reynolds). She arrives at the villa having mislaid her spoiled mistress, Filomena (the also superb Jessica Plummer), and decides to masquerade as her boss. It’s about time she was allowed to put her feet up. If she’s going to hell, she might as well enjoy the ride.
Licisca soon falls for the ludicrously hunky quack doctor Dioneo (Amar Chadha-Patel) who shoots her lusty glances while his rich, impotent master, Tindaro (a wonderfully repugnant Douggie McMeekin) tries to woo her between bouts of appalling flatulence. He’s an allergy-riven hypochondriac incel who is all too easily exploited by the dastardly doctor. “The poor man has never really had full control over his bowels, but this illness could have him perched over a chamber pot for days. A real poop show,” explains Dioneo. Toilet humour and smut quickly becomes a series trademark and only ramps up from here – that’s before you even get to the shagging.
Meanwhile, Misia (Jackson) arrives fawning over her own virulently awful mistress Pampinea (Mamet). As the latter prepares to marry the villa’s errant Viscount Leonardo, house steward Sirisco (Hale) sets about distracting the new arrivals from the fact their host might be a lot later to the party than they expect. I won’t spoil the joke…
While other comedies lean miserably into tragedy and trauma, Jordan is here simply to make us laugh. Not with lazy one-liners, but pure comedy squeezed from human truth. The social satire of the book - which skewers the upstairs and downstairs of 14th century Italy - is interspersed with lavish dollops of soapy fun and a gag rate that will have you rewinding to catch the ones you missed. From the first 10 minutes, it is crystal clear who everyone is and what they want – the efficiency is breathtaking.
In interviews, Jordan has said the early days of Covid were an inspiration and in particular some “tone deaf” moments where celebrities revealed how totally out of touch they were with the rest of us. Remember Gal Gadot’s cover of “Imagine”? This show is packed with examples of unchecked privilege, the misplaced “same boat” mentality abounds.
Above all, it’s a spectacular comic exercise in proving that nothing has changed in hundreds of years – you can’t buy your way out of death and we’re all just slaves to fortune in the end. The First World problems of the Middle Ages ring as true no]w as they ever did. As newlywed Panfilo (Karan Gill) explains to his pious, sexually frustrated wife Neifile (Lou Gala) when trying to hurry her pre-holiday confession to get to dinner: “They always serve the best dishes at the welcome dinner. Then it’s just pasta pesto.”
The Decameron is the stand-out comedy hit of the year so far and without a doubt the most fun I’ve had watching TV in a long, long time.
‘The Decameron’ is streaming on Netflix