The Rundown: Something Fascinating Is Happening On ‘Fargo’

The Rundown is a weekly column that highlights some of the biggest, weirdest, and most notable events of the week in entertainment. The number of items could vary, as could the subject matter. It will not always make a ton of sense. Some items might not even be about entertainment, to be honest, or from this week. The important thing is that it’s Friday, and we are here to have some fun.

Are you watching Fargo I hope you are. I hope you are watching Fargo for a lot of reasons. It’s a good show. And I want more people who I can talk to about it. And because there are many worse things you can be doing — probably are doing — with the hour a week the show would cost you. You could be spending that hour doomscrolling through your social media platform of choice, or something slightly less self-destructive like repeatedly smashing yourself in the foot with a hammer. But mostly I hope you are watching Fargo so you can see what Salvatore Esposito is doing with the character of Gaetano Fadda.

Quick background: Gaetano Fadda is the younger brother of Josto Fadda, played by Jason Schwartzman, which is great because the size difference between the two men is massive. Gaetano is huge, and just back from Italy, and violent and short-tempered, and he has this teeny-tiny mustache on his big body. At one point he said the sentence, “In the land of taking and killing, Gaetano is king,” which is great on a few levels before we even get to the third-person part.

He is also — and I must stress here that this next part is not hyperbole — doing so much, all the time. You have never seen so much acting. It’s not that he’s just chewing up the scenery. This isn’t a Kevin Spacey in House of Cards situation, or even a John Travolta in anything but especially the O.J. show situation. He’s going big — HUGE — with every single line, with every movement, on purpose, in a way that is extremely Fargo. Look at what he does with this cigarette.

Did you see it Did you see my beautiful ornery rhinoceros take a lit cigarette out of his mouth and crush it with his massive fist Why would he do that Why would anyone do that Other than to delight me, I mean. Because if that was the goal, baby, consider the mission accomplished. I don’t know if any show on television mixes the dramatic and absurd quite like Fargo. It’s got long thoughtful speeches about what it means to be American when America is a nation of immigrants, and who gets to be considered American first, and those speeches are occasionally delivered by a man named Doctor Senator who is neither a doctor nor a senator. Two of this season’s first three episodes featured powerful farts that played a legitimately important part in the action. Fargo contains multitudes.

But I’m getting off-topic. Look at Gaetano take this shot.

I adore it. I love it so much. Every single time he’s on-screen he is just doing the absolute most he can. Every movement is exaggerated as far as it can go, every staredown results in his eyeballs bulging halfway out of his head, every line is delivered as though it might be the last thing the character ever gets to say. It’s kind of like the show plopped a character from a silent film right into the action and let him start speaking two languages. I know it might not be for everyone. I’ve spoken to a few people who find it a little grating. And that’s fine. The nice thing about this country is that you can be as wrong as you want in public and we usually won’t throw you in jail for it. But again, I do love it very much. It’s one of the reasons I appreciate Fargo, this mix of the smart and the ridiculous, the subtle and the huge. Gaetano Fadda sums this up perfectly.

I hope, before the end of the season, someone whacks him on the head with a frying pan and a big red lump grows out of his head and a bunch of little tweeting birds start circling it, like he’s in a cartoon. This would make me happy.

Well, guess what: Dexter is back. It doesn’t matter if you wanted Dexter back, or if you had even considered Dexter coming back to be a thing you could want, or if you had kind of forgotten Dexter even existed. It’s back. Showtime is bringing it back. For a 10-episode limited series. That continues the story where it left off. Which, as I have been informed by people who watched Dexter after the first season, ended with Dexter becoming a lumberjack for some reason Not important. Or maybe it is. Who knows The point here is that Dexter is back.

And this is where the logical and what I’ll call “thinky” part of my brain wants to start throwing stuff. It’s mostly because of the thing we discussed last week where lots of good and fun shows with more niche-type audiences are getting axed — after being renewed — due to the COVID of it all (rising budgets, goofed-up schedules, etc.) and it is bumming me out tremendously. There’s a future we’re staring down in the entertainment industry that mirrors what we’re staring down in the restaurant industry, with lots of neat little spots disappearing and the massive chains and their larger cash reserves being the only survivors. The Dexter revival series, despite being something no one asked for and something not half as interesting as a GLOW or High Fidelity, will probably do numbers those shows never did. Maybe the better analogy is Hollywood going all-in on blockbusters and sequels a few years back because they knew those would get butts in seats. Maybe I only used the restaurant analogy because I’m hungry right now. I guess we’ll never know.

There is a second part of my brain, though. This part is not as logical. This is the part that loves anarchy and rascals and cackling at truly awful scenes from television and movies. And that part of my brain saw “Dexter is coming back” and immediately remembered the treadmill scene from the final season. A season I did not even watch. That’s how flabbergasting the scene is. It has embedded itself in the deepest parts of my subconscious and set up a dwelling there for over five years despite the fact that I have no idea what is happening or why. You might be with me on this. Or maybe you’re about to be. Watch this clip twice.

That stunt double is so clearly a 33-year-old man that I’m surprised the actress playing his mom — Yvonne Strahovski — did not bring him a glass of scotch after the fall. I love it so much. So, look, while I do not, in principle, support unnecessary reboots, especially in a time when better shows are dropping left and right like blond children on treadmills, if each renewal can bring me as much fleeting joy as this one brought me, fine. I’ll sign off. I’m still mad about GLOW and High Fidelity, and I still want answers and/or heads at some point. But I’ll give you all a pass this time.

James Caan is probably best known for playing tough guy Sonny Corleone in The Godfather, and for playing a string of similarly tough guys in movies and television shows over the next 40-plus years. I say this not to judge the man’s career, mostly because you can do pretty much whatever you feel like if you have The Godfather on your IMDb page. No, I say this because it makes the next thing I am about to say much funnier, which is all that matters to me in most situations. Here goes: James Caan is, today, in 2020, apparently, really into Angry Birds.

— James Caan (@James_Caan) August 29, 2020

This was August. Fine. Great. We’re all looking for ways to pass the time right now. I have no issue with beloved actor James Caan developing an Angry Birds habit. There are far worse ways to spend your day. As long as it’s not consuming him and sending him into wild and/or hilarious conspiracy-fueled fits of fury that he also posts on Twitter or something. That would not be healthy. Anyway, let’s scroll ahead to Septemb-