安妮·海瑟薇的《摩登情愛》，是否值得期待?

It’s fitting that Amazon’s “Modern Love,” which debuts Friday and draws its stories from the New York Times column of the same name, puts forward the best version of itself in the very beginning. No one who has ever dated needs reminding that first impressions can be misleading, but the solid narrative skills and excellent casting on display in the premiere episode help prop up the wispier aspects of this inconsistent but sometimes charming anthology series.

將于周五首播、故事取材于《紐約時報》同名專欄的亞馬遜劇集《摩登情愛》(Modern Love)，從一開始就將最好的自己展現(xiàn)了出來。任何曾經(jīng)約會的人都不需要提醒自己，第一印象可能具有誤導(dǎo)性，不過第一集中展現(xiàn)的扎實的敘事技巧和優(yōu)秀的演員陣容，有助于彌補這部良莠不齊但時顯魅力的獨立單元劇集的一些弱項。

In that episode, Cristin Milioti plays a single New Yorker whose relationship with her doorman (the wonderful Laurentiu Possa) becomes the unexpected and occasionally irksome cornerstone of her life. This unlikely duo’s saga — which, like a number of other installments, doesn’t hinge on romantic love — is given lyrical, wise treatment by the writer, director and executive producer John Carney (“Once,” “Sing Street”). Milioti and Possa, who bring very different but ultimately harmonious energies to the tale, are delightful to watch together.

克里斯汀·米利歐緹(Cristin Milioti)在這一集飾演一個單身紐約人，她與門衛(wèi)(非凡的勞倫提烏·波薩[Laurentiu Possa]飾演)的關(guān)系成了她生活中意想不到、偶爾也讓人厭煩的基石。這對不符合一般認(rèn)知的二人組的故事——像許多其他的故事一樣，并不依賴?yán)寺膼矍?mdash;—得到了編劇、導(dǎo)演兼執(zhí)行制片約翰·卡尼(John Carney)(《曾經(jīng)》[Once]、《初戀這首情歌》[Sing Street])詩意、明智的處理。米利歐緹和波薩給故事帶來了非常不同，但最終趨于和諧的能量，看兩人在一起的戲令人愉悅。

Milioti’s character lives in a lovely doorman apartment on a freelance book reviewer’s income, a scenario that, even with rent control, is more fanciful than anything that ever transpired on “Game of Thrones.” Similar real-estate porn is on display in a number of other episodes, which mostly revolve around hyper-articulate middle- and upper-middle-class characters. A few days after watching these episodes, décor details of some of the boho-affluent homes were easier to recall than the stories that took place within those dwellings. (For some viewers this will be a feature, not a bug.)

米利歐緹的角色住在一個可愛的有門衛(wèi)公寓里，靠的是一個自由職業(yè)書評人的收入，這樣的情境，即使有房租監(jiān)管，也比《權(quán)力的游戲》(Game of Thrones)里發(fā)生的任何事情都要離奇。還有幾集也存在這種房地產(chǎn)誘惑色彩，主要圍繞伶牙俐齒的中、上中產(chǎn)階級人物展開。看了這些劇集幾天后，你更多地會回想起那些波西米亞富人家裝細節(jié)，而不是發(fā)生在這些居住環(huán)境中的故事。(對一些觀眾來說，這是個亮點，而不是漏洞。)

“Modern Love,” when it works, provides the kind of soothing comfort supplied by an inviting armchair, a warm fire, or a mug of hot tea on a chilly night. It’s the TV equivalent of a hand-knit cardigan or an Instagrammable latte; a mood of transitory wistfulness appears to be the goal, not some chest-thumping artistic statement about Life. And there’s certainly room for this kind of artisanal woolly sweater on the TV scene: The real world and the headlines it generates are not much fun these days, and when the actors in the best-written “Modern Love” installments are on their A-games, it’s hard to resist the appeal of these amiable, slightly world-weary stories of connection in the big city.

好的時候，《摩登情愛》可以提供一種舒適的慰藉，像是一把誘人的扶手椅、一團溫暖的爐火，或寒冷夜晚的一杯熱茶。它像一件手工編織的開襟羊毛衫或一杯適合拍照分享的拿鐵;它的目標(biāo)似乎是一種短暫的愁緒，而不是拍著胸脯做出某種藝術(shù)性的生活宣言。這種手工制作的羊毛衫在電視上當(dāng)然是有市場的：如今，現(xiàn)實世界和由此產(chǎn)生的新聞標(biāo)題都不怎么有趣，而當(dāng)寫得最好的那些《摩登情愛》中，演員們都拿出最佳發(fā)揮時，這些在大城市里發(fā)生的親切、有點厭世的關(guān)系故事讓人很難抗拒。

That said, the most pleasing thing about the show may be its format: Each episode lasts a half-hour. Thus if you don’t understand why, say, the recent Emmy winner Julia Garner and the versatile character actor Shea Whigham — both terrific in many past projects — are stranded in a flat, meandering story that never quite gels (“So He Looked Like Dad. It Was Just Dinner, Right?”), at least you won’t be wondering for long.

盡管如此，這部劇最讓人開心的地方可能是它的形式：每集半小時。因此，如果你不明白為什么新科艾美獎得主朱莉婭·加納(Julia Garner)和變化多端的性格演員希亞·威甘(Shea Whigham)——兩人在過去的許多影片中都有出色表現(xiàn)——現(xiàn)在卻被困在一個平淡、曲折、似乎永遠不會凝固的故事里(“是，他長得像爸。就是吃頓飯，對吧?”)，至少你不會困惑太久。

The fifth episode (“At the Hospital, an Interlude of Clarity”) similarly drops its two lead actors into a getting-to-know-you story meant to showcase the characters’ spiky, halting chemistry. Unfortunately there’s no spark evident between Sofia Boutella and John Gallagher Jr., despite the actors’ game efforts, and that glaring absence makes the thinness of their story and the forced, brittle nature of their dialogue more apparent. All in all, about half of the episodes of “Modern Love” make strange decisions about what to spend time on, a dicey proposition when there’s only 30 minutes to work with.

第五集(“在醫(yī)院，一段澄清事實的插曲”)同樣將兩位主角帶入了一個互相了解的故事，旨在展示人物之間尖銳而又遲疑的化學(xué)反應(yīng)。遺憾的是，盡管演員索菲婭·布特拉(Sofia Boutella)和小約翰·加拉格爾(John Gallagher Jr.)付出了勇敢的努力，但他們之間并沒有明顯的火花，這種明顯的缺失讓故事的單薄和對白的勉強與脆弱變得更加明顯?？偠灾?，《摩登愛情》有一半劇集會在一些奇怪的事情上消耗時間，這可是很危險的，因為只有30分鐘的時間。

Of course, the reasons for some storytelling shortcuts are obvious, if not fully justifiable. Anne Hathaway stars in “Take Me as I Am, Whoever I Am” as a woman whose career and romances go awry because she’s secretive about the challenges that mental illness creates in her life. The episode includes a decent but unnecessary song-and-dance number and other moments of highly dramatic filler, all of which reinforces the notion that the episode was constructed more as a showcase for Hathaway than as an insightful character portrait. She supplies some raw, gripping moments, but they mostly arrive at the end, after a string of repetitive scenes that drain the premise of momentum.

當(dāng)然，在敘事上抄近道的理由是顯而易見的。安妮·海瑟薇(Anne Hathaway)在“接受真實的我，不管我是誰”一集中飾演一個事業(yè)和愛情都出了問題的女人，因為她絕口不提精神疾病給她生活帶來的挑戰(zhàn)。這一集中有一個挺好但不必要的歌舞場面，以及其他一些高度戲劇化的充數(shù)橋段，所有這些都令人深深感到，這一集更多是在展示海瑟薇，而不是勾勒一個深刻的人物肖像。她提供了一些原始的、扣人心弦的瞬間，但大多是到了最后，經(jīng)歷了一系列耗盡故事動力的重復(fù)場景之后才出現(xiàn)的。

If you were excited to see Tina Fey and John Slattery play a bickering married couple in an episode written and directed by the “Catastrophe” co-creator Sharon Horgan, the slightly deflating reality is that the result is merely acceptable — no more, no less.

如果你很興奮地看到蒂娜·菲(Tina Fey)和約翰·斯萊特里(John Slattery)在《大災(zāi)難》(Catastrophe)劇創(chuàng)之一莎倫·霍根(Sharon Horgan)編導(dǎo)的一集里扮演一對爭吵不休的夫妻，那么稍微令人沮喪的現(xiàn)實是，其結(jié)果僅僅是可以接受而已——不多也不少。

Scenes of couples throwing passive-aggressive darts at each other in a therapist’s office are not rare on TV. The kind of rebuilding attempts that are necessary to bring a dying long-term relationship back to life — moments often brilliantly explored on “Catastrophe” — would have given both actors more to work with. But too often the episode, “Rallying to Keep the Game Alive,” speeds past the juiciest, thorniest, most revelatory moments. Still, it’s not exactly punishment to see Fey and Slattery share their wry camaraderie onscreen.

夫妻在治療師的辦公室里主動或被動攻擊對方的場景在電視上并不少見。這種重建的嘗試是讓一段垂死的長期關(guān)系脫離危險境地所必需的——這些時刻在“大災(zāi)難”中往往有精彩的探討——會給兩位演員更多發(fā)揮的空間。但“共同努力，讓游戲繼續(xù)下去”一集往往頻繁跳過最有趣、最痛苦、最具啟示性的時刻。盡管如此，看到菲和史萊特利在屏幕上分享他們扭曲的感情，并不算是一種懲罰。

A flashback-driven episode starring Dev Patel and Catherine Keener, in which the two leads recount stories of love and regret, is ultimately more effective. If the core stories wrap up a bit too neatly, the actors’ empathic skills and natural charisma are more than worth the price of admission.

在由戴夫·帕特爾(Dev Patel)和凱瑟琳·基納(Catherine Keener)主演的倒敘一集中，兩個主角講述了愛與遺憾的故事，最終效果更好。雖然核心故事的結(jié)尾有點過于簡單，但演員的移情能力和天生的魅力還是值回票價。

All in all, the three finest episodes — the first, seventh and eighth — have a bit more heft, depth and clarity than the others.

總而言之，最好的三集——第一集、第七集和第八集——比其他幾集更有分量、更有深度，也更清晰。

The seventh episode tells the story of a married couple’s spiky relationship with the woman having their baby, and in it, Andrew Scott and Brandon Kyle Goodman are both deeply appealing and believably nervous. Scott radiates an intelligent, thoughtful curiosity here, as he did as the Hot Priest in “Fleabag.” As a public service, I must inform you that he never dons a cassock, which may increase or decrease this half-hour’s overall hotness levels, depending on the viewer’s preferences.

第七集講述了一對已婚夫婦與懷了他們孩子的女人之間的尖銳關(guān)系，在其中，安德魯·斯科特(Andrew Scott) 和布蘭登·凱爾·古德曼(Brandon Kyle Goodman)都深具感染力，帶有令人信服的神經(jīng)質(zhì)。斯科特在這集中散發(fā)出一種睿智的、深思熟慮的好奇心，一如他在《倫敦生活》(Fleabag)中扮演的性感神父。為了服務(wù)大家，我必須告訴你，他從不穿圣袍，這可能提升或降低這半小時的整體熱度——取決于觀眾的偏好。

It’d be churlish — and anti-romantic — to give away too much about the season finale of “Modern Love,” which has a closing sequence that is worth watching, even if you skip around before you arrive at the end. It’s not a spoiler to say that Jane Alexander is sensational in this meditation on the risks and rewards of love that arrives late in life. This episode mixes the sweet, the sad and the bittersweet in just the right proportions, and who knows, it may well provide a road map for the show’s future. If Amazon decides “Modern Love” deserves a second date, that is.

透露太多《摩登愛情》(Modern Love)本季最后一集的信息是不對的——也有悖于浪漫，它有個值得一看的結(jié)局，即使你在結(jié)尾之前跳過了一些片段。簡·亞歷山大(Jane Alexander)在這段關(guān)于愛情的風(fēng)險和回報的沉思中表現(xiàn)得驚為天人，這么說并不是劇透。這一集將甜蜜、悲傷和苦樂交織在一起，而且比例恰到好處，誰知道呢，這可能會為這部劇的未來提供一個路線圖。如果亞馬遜認(rèn)為《摩登愛情》值得第二次約會，那就是了。