''Physical'' is an American

comedy-drama Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

television series created by Annie Weisman that premiered on

Apple TV+ Apple TV is a digital media player and microconsole developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is a small network appliance hardware that plays received media data such as video and audio to a television set or external display. Since its secon ...

on June 18, 2021. In August 2021, the series was renewed for a second season ahead of its first season finale which premiered on June 3, 2022. In August 2022, the series was renewed for a third season.

Premise

Set in 1980s

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

, ''Physical'' is a dark comedy following Sheila Rubin (

Rose Byrne Mary Rose Byrne (born 24 July 1979) is an Australian actress. She made her screen debut in the film ''Dallas Doll'' (1994), and continued to act in Australian film and television throughout the 1990s. She obtained her first leading film role i ...

) through her journey of self discovery via aerobics.

Cast and characters

Main cast

as Sheila Rubin *

Rory Scovel Rory J. Scovel (born August 6, 1980) is an American comedian, actor, and writer. He released his first stand-up comedy album ''Dilation'' in 2011. He has since released the stand-up specials ''The Charleston Special'' (2015), ''Rory Scovel Tries ...

as Danny Rubin, Sheila's husband *

Paul Sparks Paul Sparks (born October 16, 1971) is an American actor. He is known for his roles as gangster Mickey Doyle in the HBO period drama series ''Boardwalk Empire'', writer Thomas Yates in the Netflix political drama series ''House of Cards (Americ ...

as John Breem, a mall owner * Della Saba as Bunny Kazam, an aerobics instructor and Tyler's girlfriend *

Lou Taylor Pucci Lou Taylor Pucci (born July 27, 1985) is an American actor who first appeared on film in Rebecca Miller's '' Personal Velocity: Three Portraits'' in 2002. Pucci had his breakthrough leading role in '' Thumbsucker'' (2005), for which he won a Speci ...

as Tyler, a surfer and Bunny's boyfriend * Dierdre Friel as Greta Hauser, a housewife and Ernie's wife *

Geoffrey Arend Geoffrey Rashid Arend (born February 28, 1978) is an American film, television, voice and theater actor. He is best known for his role as List of Body of Proof characters#Ethan Gross, Ethan Gross on the American Broadcasting Company, ABC drama ser ...

as Jerry Goldman, an old friend of Sheila and Danny who becomes Danny's campaign manager (season 1; guest season 2) *

Ashley Liao Ashley Liao (born October 21, 2001) is an American actress. She began her career as a child actress in the series '' Fuller House'' and ''The Kicks''. She has since appeared in the Disney+ film ''Secret Society of Second-Born Royals'' and the Ap ...

as Simone (season 1)

Recurring cast

Ian Gomez Ian Braque Gomez (born December 27, 1964) is an American actor known for his comedic TV work, which include series-regular roles as Javier on '' Felicity'' and Andy on ''Cougar Town''. Early life He was born in New York City, New York, to an art ...

as Ernie Hauser, a tech pioneer and Greta's husband * Erin Pineda as Maria Breem, John's wife * Grace Kelly Quigley as Maya Rubin, Sheila and Danny's daughter *

Wallace Langham James Wallace Langham II (born March 11, 1965) is an American actor. He is best known for playing the role of Phil the Head Writer on ''The Larry Sanders Show''. He has also played the roles of David Hodges on the crime drama television series '' ...

as Auggie Cartwright (season 2; guest season 1) *

Murray Bartlett Murray Bartlett (born 20 March 1971) is an Australian actor. His roles include Dominic "Dom" Basaluzzo in the HBO comedy-drama series ''Looking'', Michael "Mouse" Tolliver in the Netflix revival of ''Tales of the City'', and Armond in the HBO sa ...

as Vinnie Green, an aerobics instructor (season 2) *

Anna Gunn Anna Gunn (born August 11, 1968) is an American actress. She is best known for her role as Skyler White on the AMC drama series ''Breaking Bad'' (2008–2013), for which she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a D ...

as Marika Green, Vinnie’s wife (season 2) *

Tawny Newsome Tawny Newsome (born February 24, 1983) is an American musician, comedian, and actress best known for playing Chelsea Leight-Leigh on ''Bajillion Dollar Propertie$'', co-starring in ''Space Force'' and the third season of ''Brockmire'', and co-h ...

as Wanda (season 2) * Donny Divanian as Kevin Cartwright, Auggie’s son (season 2) * Emjay Anthony as Zeke Breem, John and Maria's son (season 2; portrayed by Ian Ousley in season 1)

Episodes

Series overview

Season 1 (2021)

Season 2 (2022)

Production

Development

In January 2020, it was reported that

Apple An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple fruit tree, trees are agriculture, cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, wh ...

was nearing a series order for ''Physical'', created and written by Annie Weisman, with

Tomorrow Studios Martin Bruce Adelstein is an American television producer. Before becoming a producer, he was a partner at the Endeavor Talent Agency, where he was one of the founding members. As of 2019, Adelstein is the CEO and founder of Tomorrow Studios, a joi ...

set to produce. In December 2020,

Craig Gillespie Craig Gillespie (born 1 September 1967) is an Australian-American film, television, music video, and commercial director. He is best known for directing the films ''Lars and the Real Girl'' (2007), ''Fright Night'' (2011), ''I, Tonya'' (2017), ...

Liza Johnson Liza Johnson (born December 13, 1970) is an American film director, producer, and writer. Biography Johnson was born in Portsmouth, Ohio, in 1970. She attended Williams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, graduating with a B.A. in Visual ...

, and

Stephanie Laing Stephanie Laing is an American filmmaker known primarily for her work on TV. She has worked on shows such as '' Tracey Takes On...'', ''Tracey Ullman's Visible Panty Lines'', ''Vice Principals'', ''Divorce'', ''Veep'', and '' Eastbound & Down''. S ...

were announced as directors for the series, with Gillespie set to direct the pilot episode. The series is a half-hour long and consists of ten episodes. On August 4, 2021, Apple TV+ renewed the series for a second season. On August 11, 2022, Apple TV+ renewed the series for a third season.

Casting

In January 2020,

was reported as headlining ''Physical''. In December 2020, it was announced that Byrne was playing the role of Sheila Rubin, with

, Della Saba, Dierdre Friel, and

joining the cast.

joined the cast in January 2021, with

joining in April 2021. In October 2022,

Zooey Deschanel Zooey Claire Deschanel (; born January 17, 1980) is an American actress, singer, and songwriter. She made her film debut in '' Mumford'' (1999) and had a supporting role in Cameron Crowe's film ''Almost Famous'' (2000). Deschanel is known for he ...

joining the cast for the third season.

Filming

Filming for the first season began in November 2020 and ended in March 2021. The second season began filming in November 2021 and ended in March 2022.

Release

The series premiered on June 18, 2021, on Apple TV + globally with the first three episodes available immediately and the rest debuting on a weekly basis, every Friday. The second season premiered on June 3, 2022.

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the first season holds an approval rating of 67% based on 48 critic reviews, with an average rating of 6.49/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Not even a magnetic performance from Rose Byrne can save ''Physical'' from its exhausting parade of unpleasant characters and plot choices." On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, it has a weighted average score of 60 out of 100, based on 21 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". German online magazine ''

Spiegel Spiegel is German, Yiddish, and Dutch for "mirror". More specifically, it may refer to: Publications * '' Der Spiegel'', a weekly German magazine * Der Spiegel (online), the online sibling of ''Der Spiegel'' Political * Spiegel scandal, a 1962 ...

'' was delighted and pointed out the difference between American and European reception, saying "that snarky social satire pitches into body cult and consumeristic insanity to our veritable pleasure; American critics were rather appalled – without any reason." The second season has an approval rating of 91% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 11 critic reviews, with an average rating of 8.6/10.

References

External links

* {{Apple TV+ Apple TV+ original programming 2021 American television series debuts 2020s American comedy-drama television series English-language television shows Television series set in the 1980s Television shows set in San Diego