Netflix
Tina Fey’s The Four Seasons Is a Bittersweet Masterclass in Midlife Comedy
Tina Fey returns to peak form with Netflix’s The Four Seasons, a sharp, heartfelt, and hilariously honest exploration of ageing friendships, crumbling marriages, and the existential absurdities of midlife. Co-created with Tracey Wigfield and Lang Fisher, the eight-episode series is a modern reimagining of the 1981 Alan Alda film of the same name—but this update is infused with Fey’s signature wit and a deeper emotional resonance that makes it both painfully funny and quietly profound.
Set over a year, The Four Seasons follows three well-off couples in their 50s who have been inseparable since their college years. Every season, they retreat together for mini-breaks—lavish, carefully curated escapes that, beneath the surface, reveal the fragile balances and long-held tensions in their relationships. It’s like White Lotus without the body count, or The Big Chill with a streaming-age sensibility.
Tina Fey stars as Kate, a tightly wound planner whose carefully organised getaways serve as emotional anchor points for the group. She’s married to Jack (Will Forte), the laid-back peacemaker whose tolerance often serves as a pressure valve when the group’s many dramas boil over. Their dynamic is quietly brilliant—more eye-rolls than affection, but undeniably solid.
Everything shifts when Nick (played with moving subtlety by Steve Carell) announces he’s leaving his wife of 25 years, Anne (Kerri Kenney-Silver), a devoted, unsuspecting partner secretly planning a vow renewal. The fallout reverberates through the group, testing loyalties and sparking uncomfortable reckonings. The show’s opening episodes deftly mix comedy with cringeworthy moments, as friends debate whether to warn Anne while preparing to attend a ceremony they know is built on a lie.
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The ensemble is rounded out by Claude (Marco Calvani), the stereotypically “passionate Italian” given surprising nuance, and his partner Danny (Colman Domingo), whose reflections on ageing and loss add emotional depth to the show’s later episodes. When Steve Carell’s Nick introduces his 32-year-old girlfriend Ginny (Erika Henningsen) into the mix, things get more complicated and hilarious.
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From eco-resorts with thin walls to college plays titled “Once upon a time my dad destroyed my family and started dating a stupid bitch,” the series leans into farce without ever losing sight of the emotional truth beneath the absurdity. Fey’s writing captures the ache of long-term intimacy—how love can be measured not by grand gestures, but by remembering your partner’s sandwich order or surrendering the nicer bathroom.
But The Four Seasons is no nostalgia trap. It navigates modern life without bitterness or boomer-style scorn. A standout moment comes when Steve Carell’s Nick, overwhelmed by his girlfriend’s sexual history and the unfamiliar language of “fluidity,” pleads for Danny to explain the concept. It’s not a punchline; it’s a sincere cry for understanding in a changing world.
Part Golden Girls, part Gilmore Girls on HRT, and entirely Tina Fey, The Four Seasons is a rare gem—bitingly funny, emotionally honest, and unafraid to ask what it means to grow older with grace, humour, and love.
