''Shrinking'' 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 Bill Lawrence,

Jason Segel Jason Jordan Segel ( ; born January 18, 1980) is an American actor, comedian, producer and screenwriter. He is best known for his role as Marshall Eriksen in the CBS sitcom ''How I Met Your Mother'', as well as for his work with director and pr ...

and

Brett Goldstein Brett Goldstein (born 17 July 1980) is a British actor, comedian, and writer. He is best known for writing and starring as Roy Kent in the Apple TV+ sports comedy series ''Ted Lasso'' (2020–present), for which he received the Primetime Emmy A ...

. The series stars Segel as a grieving therapist who decides to become drastically more involved in his patients' lives.

Harrison Ford Harrison Ford (born July 13, 1942) is an American actor. His films have grossed more than $5.4billion in North America and more than $9.3billion worldwide, making him the seventh-highest-grossing actor in North America. He is the recipient o ...

, Jessica Williams,

Christa Miller Christa Beatrice Miller is an American actress and model who has achieved success in television comedy. Her foremost roles include Kate O'Brien on ''The Drew Carey Show'' and Jordan Sullivan on ''Scrubs''. She has also appeared in ''Seinfeld'', ...

Michael Urie Michael Lorenzo Urie (born August 8, 1980) is an American actor. He is known for his portrayal of Marc St. James on the ABC dramedy television series ''Ugly Betty''. He can be heard as Bobby Kerns in ''As the Curtain Rises'', an original podcas ...

, Luke Tennie, and Lukita Maxwell also star. The series premiered on January 27, 2023, 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 ...

. It has received positive reviews, with praise for its performances, writing, humor, and examination of grief. It was renewed for a second season in March 2023. The first season received two nominations at the

75th Primetime Emmy Awards The 75th Primetime Emmy Awards will honor the best in American prime time television programming from June 1, 2022, until May 31, 2023, as chosen by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The ceremony will be broadcast on Fox on January 15, ...

Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series This is a list of winners and nominees of the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series. The award is presented to the best performance by a lead actor in a television comedy series. Beginning with the 18th Primetime Emmy ...

for Segel and Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for Williams. The first season also received three nominations from both the

Critics' Choice Awards The Critics' Choice Movie Awards (formerly known as the Broadcast Film Critics Association Award) is an awards show presented annually by the American-Canadian Critics Choice Association (CCA) to honor the finest in cinematic achievement. Writt ...

and the

TCA Awards The TCA Awards are awards presented by the Television Critics Association in recognition of excellence in television. There are eleven categories, which are presented every summer towards the end of the organization's summer press tour. Due to ...

, with Ford being recognized by both groups for his performance.

Premise

A therapist, Jimmy Laird, dealing with severe grief after his wife's death, begins to breach ethical barriers by telling his patients what he really thinks, resulting in massive changes to his and their lives.

Cast

Main

as Jimmy Laird, a therapist who works at the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Center, and is grieving the death of his wife * Jessica Williams as Gaby, a fellow therapist working with Jimmy at the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Center * Luke Tennie as Sean, a patient suffering from anger management issues who has sessions with Jimmy *

as Brian, Jimmy's best friend who is a lawyer * Lukita Maxwell as Alice, Jimmy's teenage daughter with whom he shares a strained relationship *

as Liz, Jimmy's next-door neighbor who also helps with looking after Alice *

as Dr. Paul Rhoades, a senior therapist and colleague of Jimmy's at the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Center who has

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a long-term degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that mainly affects the motor system. The symptoms usually emerge slowly, and as the disease worsens, non-motor symptoms becom ...

Recurring

Ted McGinley Ted Martin McGinley (born May 30, 1958) is an American actor. He is known for his roles as Jefferson D'Arcy on the television sitcom '' Married... with Children'' and as Charley Shanowski on the ABC sitcom ''Hope & Faith''. He was a late regular ...

as Derek, Liz's husband *

Heidi Gardner Heidi Lynn Gardner (born July 27, 1983) is an American actress, comedian, and writer. She has been a cast member on ''Saturday Night Live'' since 2017, beginning in season 43. Early life Gardner was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri. S ...

as Grace, one of Jimmy's patients *

Lilan Bowden Alice Lilan Bowden (born September 1, 1985) is an American actress, filmmaker, and comedian. She is best known for her roles as Rebecca "Bex" Mack in ''Andi Mack'' and Amber Kang in the Netflix series '' Murderville''. Life and career Lilan Bowde ...

as Tia, Jimmy's wife and Alice's mother who died in a car accident * Kimberly Condict as Wally, one of Jimmy's patients who has

obsessive–compulsive disorder Obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) is a mental and behavioral disorder in which an individual has intrusive thoughts and/or feels the need to perform certain routines repeatedly to the extent where it induces distress or impairs general ...

* Devin Kawaoka as Charlie, Brian's fiancé * Rachel Stubington as Summer, Alice's best friend at school *

Lily Rabe Lily Rabe (born June 29, 1982) is an American actress. She is best known for her multiple roles on the FX anthology horror series ''American Horror Story'' (2011–2021). For her performance as Portia in the Broadway production of ''The Merchan ...

as Meg, Paul's daughter *

Wendie Malick Wendie Malick (born December 13, 1950) is an American actress and former fashion model, known for her roles in various television comedies. She starred as Judith Tupper Stone in the HBO sitcom '' Dream On'', and as Nina Van Horn in the NBC sitc ...

as Dr. Julie Baram, a neurologist treating Paul's Parkinson's disease with whom he eventually begins a romance *

Tilky Jones Tilky Montgomery Jones (born June 24, 1981) is an American singer and actor. He was a member of the band Take 5 from 1997 to 2001. Life and career Jones was born in Vero Beach, Florida. He pursued acting after the breakup of his band, Take 5. ...

as Donny, Grace's abusive husband

Guest

* Asif Ali as Alan, one of Jimmy's patients *

Miriam Flynn Miriam Flynn (born June 18, 1952) is an American voice and character actress. She is best known as Cousin Catherine in the ''National Lampoon's Vacation'' and Grandma Longneck in ''The Land Before Time'' franchises. She has acted in other films a ...

as Pam, Jimmy and Liz's heavily disliked neighbor *

Gavin Lewis Gavin Lewis (born October 27, 2003) is an American actor. He is best known for the role of Moody Richardson in the American drama streaming television miniseries '' Little Fires Everywhere'' and Prince Maxemil “Emil” Vanderklaut III in the N ...

as Connor, a son of neighbors Liz and Derek, and friend of Alice *

Neil Flynn Neil Richard Flynn (born November 13, 1960) is an American actor and comedian. He is best known for his roles as Janitor on '' Scrubs'' and Mike Heck in the ABC comedy series '' The Middle''. He has had notable appearances in television series, ...

as Raymond, one of Paul's patients * Brian Howe as Kip, Brian's father

Episodes

Production

It was announced in October 2021 that

had ordered a ten-episode season for the series, which would star

, who co-created alongside

and Bill Lawrence. In April 2022,

, Jessica Williams,

, Luke Tennie, and Lukita Maxwell joined the cast, with

James Ponsoldt James Adam Ponsoldt (born 1978) is an American film director, actor and screenwriter. He directed the drama films ''Off the Black'' (2006) and ''Smashed (film), Smashed'' (2012), the romantic comedy-drama ''The Spectacular Now'' (2013), and the dr ...

joining the production as a director and executive producer. As revealed in a 2023 interview with James Hibberd of ''

The Hollywood Reporter ''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Cinema of the United States, Hollywood film industry, film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade pap ...

'', Ford took up the offer to play Dr. Paul Rhoades despite mentioning years ago in 2002 that he works only once a year, citing the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

and his commitments to the titular role of the long-delayed ''

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny ''Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny'' is an upcoming American action adventure film starring Harrison Ford as archaeologist Indiana Jones in the fifth installment of the ''Indiana Jones'' film series, following ''Indiana Jones and the Ki ...

'' as one of the reasons he had done not much work as he wished and wanted to try on new things. Similarly to his role in ''

1923 Events January–February * January 9 – Lithuania begins the Klaipėda Revolt to annex the Klaipėda Region (Memel Territory). * January 11 – Despite strong British protests, troops from France and Belgium occupy the Ruhr area, t ...

'', Ford accepted the role despite there not being a script at the time, trusting that Segel, Goldstein, Lawrence and

Brian Gallivan Brian Gallivan is an American actor, writer and comedian. He gained significant attention for his Second City Network web series ''Sassy Gay Friend'', based on a character he created in 2004 Second City mainstage revue ''Red Scare''. The series s ...

would deliver him a good script. Production began in April 2022. The series was released on January 27, 2023, with the first two episodes premiering together and the rest releasing on a weekly basis. It has a total of ten episodes in the first season. The series theme song "Frightening Fishes" was written by

Ben Gibbard Benjamin Gibbard (born August 11, 1976) is an American singer, songwriter and guitarist. He is best known as the lead vocalist and guitarist of the indie rock band Death Cab for Cutie, with whom he has recorded ten studio albums, and as a membe ...

and Tom Howe. In March 2023, Apple TV+ renewed the series for a second season that started shooting on January 29, 2024.

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 Wang ...

reported an 82% approval rating with an average rating of 7.3/10, based on 83 critic reviews. The website's critics consensus reads, "''Shrinking'' has darker ideas on its mind than its earnest approach can often translate, but

and

's sparkling turns make these characters worth close analysis."

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 ...

, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 68 out of 100 based on 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Kristen Baldwin of ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...

'' gave the series a B+ and described the series as "a funny, brainy grief-com about the power—and dangers—of radical honesty." ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...

''s

Richard Roeper Richard E. Roeper (born October 17, 1959) is an American columnist and film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times''. He co-hosted the television series '' At the Movies'' with Roger Ebert from 2000 to 2008, serving as the late Gene Siskel's success ...

gave a rating of 3.5 out of 4 stars and said, "You never know what goes on behind the scenes, but one gets the feeling Ford is having a great time on this show. We're sure having a great time watching it." Writing for ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', John Anderson stated, "The overall sense is a little like laughing at a funeral; the human impulses are familiar, a little perverse and somehow comforting."

Accolades

References

External links

* * {{Apple TV+ 2020s American comedy-drama television series 2023 American television series debuts Apple TV+ original programming American English-language television shows Television series about grief Television series by Warner Bros. Television Studios Television shows set in Pasadena, California