''Scenes from a Marriage'' is an American drama television miniseries developed, written and directed by Hagai Levi produced for HBO and starring

Oscar Isaac Óscar Isaac Hernández Estrada (born March 9, 1979) is a Guatemalan-born American actor. Known for his versatility, he has been credited with breaking stereotypes about Latino characters in Hollywood. He was named the best actor of his gene ...

and

Jessica Chastain Jessica Michelle Chastain (born March 24, 1977) is an American actress and producer. Known for primarily starring in films with feminist themes, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award. ''Time' ...

. It is an English-language remake of the 1973 Swedish miniseries of the same name by

Ingmar Bergman Ernst Ingmar Bergman (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007) was a Swedish film director, screenwriter, producer and playwright. Widely considered one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time, his films are known as "profoundly ...

. It was presented at the

2021 Venice Film Festival The 78th annual Venice International Film Festival was held from 1 to 11 September 2021. South Korean director Bong Joon-ho was appointed as the President of the Jury, marking the first time a South Korean director has been picked as the festiv ...

and it premiered on September 12, 2021 on HBO.

Premise

An adaptation of the 1970s Swedish miniseries focusing on contemporary American couples.

Cast

Starring

as Jonathan Levy *

as Mira Phillips

Co-starring

Nicole Beharie Nicole Beharie is an American actress. She is best known for her starring roles in films such as the drama ''American Violet'' (2008), the psychological drama ''Shame'' (2011), the biographical sports drama '' 42'' (2013), and the independent d ...

as Kate *

Corey Stoll Corey Stoll (born March 14, 1976) is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Congressman Peter Russo on the Netflix political thriller series '' House of Cards'' (2013–2016), for which he received a Golden Globe nomination in 2013 ...

as Peter * Sunita Mani as Danielle * Shirley Rumierk as Dr. Varona *Sophia Kopera as Ava Levy *

Anna Rust Anna Rust (born 3 May 1995) is an English actress and filmmaker. She began her career as a child actress in the ITV (TV network), ITV drama ''Doctor Zhivago (TV series), Doctor Zhivago'' (2002) and the film ''The Brothers Grimm (film), The Brothe ...

as Veronica *

Michael Aloni Michael Mark Aloni (or Alony; he, מיכאל אלוני; born 31 January 1984) is an Israeli actor, director, writer and television presenter. Early life Aloni was born in Tel Aviv, to a secular Jewish family. His mother is an attorney and his ...

as Poli

Episodes

Production

It was announced in July 2020 that HBO had given the miniseries a greenlight, with Hagai Levi writing and directing and

and Michelle Williams serving as executive producers. Upon the miniseries order announcement, Isaac and Williams were also cast to star. Williams would be forced to exit her starring role in October due to a scheduling conflict, but would remain as an executive producer. She was replaced with

. In November 2020, Sunita Mani was cast in a supporting role.

and

Tovah Feldshuh Terri Sue "Tovah" Feldshuh (born December 27, 1948) is an American actress, singer, and playwright. She has been a Broadway star for more than four decades, earning four Tony Award nominations. She has also received two Emmy Award nominations f ...

would join in supporting roles in January 2021. Filming began in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

in October 2020, and was halted for two weeks in November after two production staff members tested positive for

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickl ...

Release

The five-episode limited series had its world premiere at the 78th Venice International Film Festival in the out of competition category. The limited series premiered on September 12, 2021 on HBO.

Reception

Critical response

The

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

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 Wan ...

reported a 81% approval rating with an average rating of 7.50/10, based on 48 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "Though ''Scenes from a Marriage''s straightforward approach at times struggles to justify its existence,

and

's crackling chemistry and impressive performances are a sight to behold."

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that 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 average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...

gave the series a weighted average score of 70 out of 100 based on 24 critic reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Ratings

Accolades

References

External links

* {{HBONetwork Shows 2020s American drama television miniseries 2021 American television series debuts 2021 American television series endings American television series based on Swedish television series English-language television shows HBO original programming Adaptations of works by Ingmar Bergman Television series by Home Box Office