Emily in Paris Season 5 Review – Minnie Driver is exactly what this masterpiece needs | Emily in Paris

‘TUnleash your mind and jump!” So says exotic London man Alfie (Lucien Laviscount) to Mindy (Ashley Park), his ex-girlfriend Emily’s best friend, as they flirt in a lively dance scene. This could of course serve as an instruction for Emily in Paris Season 5 viewers as well. She was once mocked for her Anglophile tendencies and superficial commitment French culturethe tender drama about an American in Paris directed by Lily Collins has become – over the past five years – one of television’s great pleasures: a lavish fever dream with gorgeous clothes, roped-off love interests and a steady karaoke soundtrack provided by Park, the Broadway star whose contract explicitly stipulates that she sings at least five times per episode. The costumes are less outlandish this time around, but still ambitious – giving the show a Sex and the City feel (they also share creator, Darren Star).

But, unlike SATC — whose spinoff And Just Like That turned into a mindless mess — Emily in Paris is free of any baggage, free to be as silly as she imagines. Most of Season 5 doesn’t take place in Paris, as our leading lady continues to mix business with pleasure in Rome with cashmere heir Marcello (Eugenio Franceschini). “Ciao and Ni Hao!“I’d rather be judging people in real life than on TV,” says Mindy, who turned down a job as a judge on Chinese show Popstar, and is now headed to Italy, just in time to help Emily and her marketing team with some #sponsored content (read: singing inside a giant martini glass). Also in town is Alfie: a reference to an unwanted fling between the two that instantly breaks all the girl code rules.

Michelin-starred Chef Gabriel (Lucas Bravo) is back as well, and you don’t need much French to understand his immediate regret at following Emily to Rome: “He said that it was a très, a très mauvaise idée.” Not that she knows he’s there: she’s too busy truffle hunting in very impractical heels, while Marcello’s sisters make snide remarks about her in Italian. At least Emily is still a force to be reckoned with in the marketing world. At some point, she had the amazing idea of ​​rubbing hamburger meat on her hands to attract the attention of a dog, whose owner, in turn, was a high-profile fashion designer. Brava!

There are many, many new faces, the best being Minnie Driver, who plays an alien socialite, and Princess Jane, who knows everyone “from Fiat to Fendi.” She’s sure she can land some high-profile clients at the Agence Grateau office in Rome (for a fee). The driver relishes the adventurousness of the whole thing, reveling in lines like: “You’ve chosen the right city to have an affair… Have fun on Saturday night, confess on Sunday!” Her character also serves an important purpose in Emily’s fourth-wall-breaking world: when we learn of her financial troubles, she becomes a conduit for a slew of productions, including – but not limited to – presenting a Peroni commercial at a party.

There is also – perhaps surprisingly – more emotional heft to this series than previous outings, and a sense that Emily and her friends are growing up. Collins became a mother in real life earlier this year, and while Emily isn’t thinking about kids, there’s definitely more maturity to the character, who looks back wistfully on her early days in Paris (she “Belle Era”She says); She abuses the workplace and mocks many of her former friends; She wonders what the future holds for her medium-distance relationship. There’s also an extended (slightly strained) metaphor about a fake handbag, and how real things are with Marcello. Emily’s boss and mysterious new heroine Sylvie (the always excellent Filipino Leroy Beaulieu) reconnects with some new men and an old friend, while Emily thinks – perhaps for the first time – that she and Mindy might not be best friends anymore.

Before things get too heavy, the series takes us back into the silly and outrageous, including a twist with Sylvie’s new love interest that is – as expected – a lot of fun. Bruno Goiri gets a lot of great, vulnerable lines too, as Emily’s colleague Luke. I just wish we could see more of my agency colleagues Gratto Confrère Julian (Samuel Arnold), the mastermind of a campaign to rebrand the anti-gay water.

However, Emily in Paris (and Rome) remains a total hoot, and the kind of thing you’ll definitely want to devour over the holidays alongside mince pies. So go on, allezTurn off your mind and jump right in…