Susan Anderson
As a kid, I was a faithful reader of my parents’ Readers Digest; the favorite page was “Laughter is the Best Medicine.” I’ve embraced this approach for years, but now more than ever. Even though I occasionally feel guilty for laughing all the way to a blood transfusion on Halloween (At least I wasn’t wearing my vampire costume that day), I’m sticking to the concept.
The funniest thing this week is how my husband, who broke his back in a “ladder incident” more than a year ago (he did not fall!), was hauling hay for the horses. In his words, “A year ago I couldn’t pick up a milk carton.” Now he could throw a packet of milk cartons if he wanted. But I’m sorry to say that he still hasn’t sold his big collection of ladders. Maybe in 2021.
As sad and horrified as I was watching the disrespect and vandalism in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, when I saw an invader stop for a selfie with a capitol policeman, I had to laugh. Of course, the attackers won’t be laughing when all the photos of them lounging in the U.S. Senate chamber come up in their trials. Still — kind of funny, I think. Now I long for a selfie of when the British stormed the Capitol and burned it nearly 200 years ago. “Hey, look at me in front of this painting of General Washington!” I imagine them sending home.
It’s all about the contrasts, for me. So many of us are happily entertained each night by the latest Netflix, Hulu or Amazon offering we can watch until the sun quits setting at 5 p.m. and we can go outside again. After devouring “The Queen’s Gambit,” which did not send me out to buy a chessboard but instead intimidated me back to Uno, my family discovered “Lilyhammer.” Picture the culture clash of a New York mobster in witness protection in Lillehammer, Norway. He asked for the location, which he happily misspells as Lilyhammer, because who would look for him in a place like that? Plus, he liked how it looked when he saw the 1994 Olympics there.
From the minute he steps onto the snowy landscape in his pointy, leather Italian shoes to when he tries to stomp along in snowshoes to illegally shoot a wolf, Frank is a study in culture clash. He has a very, very hard time with his mini driver’s license, recycling and a peaceful group called the “Night Ravens,” who patrol the streets to stop vandalism armed with good conversation and coffee. They take Frank’s bat away from him immediately. And don’t ask about the midwife he meets who is a man with a manbun. They eventually bond, by the way.
The actor who plays Frank, Steven Van Zandt, is a longtime member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band and was approached by Norwegians to do the show when he was in Bergen, Norway producing a CD for a girl band called the Cocktail Slippers. So, there’s lots of music and girl bands at the club Frank opens.
Because there are so many harsh humorous shots at pale and sometimes fat Norwegians doing seemingly ridiculous idealistic and planet-saving things, I worried about laughing so hard. Then I discovered the show was written and produced by Norwegians, so I guess it’s OK to laugh. And I see a lot to like as the guy from New York softens just a little in his snowy white landscape with friendly people in Nordic sweaters, while getting what he wants with a certain gangster style. Shaking down someone who owes him money involves a ski jump with no skis, for example. A murder is committed using knitting equipment. This being a mafia movie sendup, there is also plenty of bad language and brushes with violence. A lot of strict Norwegian gun control, but some interesting gunfights.
I picture a Wyoming guy having some of the same issues Frank has. Just the thing to laugh at on days filled with hard news. We still can’t go to the movies, eat popcorn and enjoy with hundreds of other people, but we can keep laughing.
Susan Anderson is a long-time television and print journalist living in Wyoming by choice.
January 09, 2021 at 06:45PM
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Anderson: What’s so funny, you ask? Everything - Casper Star-Tribune Online
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Funny
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