Four Weddings and a Funeral Review: Love, Chalet (Season 1 Episode 5)

The first episodes of Four Weddings and a Funeral left an odd aftertaste but fortunately Four Weddings and a Funeral Season 1 Episode 5, “Love, Chalet” is an improvement. A small improvement, but an improvement nonetheless.

Thus far, and especially in this episode, Kash’s storyline and characterization feels the most interesting. Kash (Nikesh Patel), a Pakistani Muslim character, is not your typical romantic comedy lead.

However, his foibles as he dabbles with the idea of an arranged marriage and cares for his father are endearing. It’s refreshing to see a Muslim character cast as the hero of a show and have him be written in such an an accessible way.

The focal point of this episode is Love Chalet, a reality dating show Zara joined at the tail-end of the last episode.

The whole episode plays out over the course of Zara’s run on the show, as we volley back and forth between footage from Love Chalet and the lead characters watching Love Chalet. 

The comedy for all of this is quite broad, but personally, I think the satire works.

While the show doesn’t do a great job of showing why Craig loves Zara so much, it does do an excellent job mocking reality dating shows like Love Island and Bachelor in Paradise. The challenges are ridiculous; the flirting is inane; hormones are running amuck.

Four Weddings and a Funeral understands all the things that draw us to reality dating shows. They are utterly ridiculous but they offer a sense of fun and a rare taste of romance-in-excess that so many of us secretly crave.

The show-within-a-show is fun to watch, and it’s a shame that the rest of Four Weddings and a Funeral can’t consistently capture that fun, bombastic spirit.

With that said, a few other things are starting to settle in nicely. Rebecca Rittenhouse’s performance as Ainsley has a greater sense of fun on this episode, her personality taking a more clear shape. She’s quickly becoming the most compelling of the core four group, which is a nice turnaround from earlier episodes.

Her chemistry with guest star Dermot Mulroney (romantic comedy royalty in his own right) is also quite interesting. It’s almost a certainty that will lead somewhere.

Gemma is also more likable but she can still come off as a ripoff of Helen from Bridesmaids.

Plus, the question remains: is anyone actually like her in real life? It’s a character, that while amusing, simply doesn’t feel grounded in reality. With that said, she’s the character most similar to those in the original film, so I suppose she gets a pass for now.

The Duffy/Maya romance storyline is uneven and for the most part, it simply does not work.

While viewers were clued in early in the series that Duffy (John Reynolds) had pined for Maya (Nathalie Emmanuel) for years, her positively responding to his confession by kissing him felt…unearned? Flat?

Maya’s reticence about the whole affair is apparent, and that feels relatable given the situation. As Ainsley explains, by being with Duffy, Maya is “finally dating someone nice.”

Maya’s reeling from a breakup with the senator and the uncomfortable realization that she’s drawn to her best friend’s ex-fiance. It follows that she would want something comfortable, something seemingly easy. 

In theory, that makes sense. Duffy is her longtime friend, and he knows her well. But simply knowing someone does not make a relationship easy, or more importantly, make it the right one. What’s clear is that there is some passion missing, at least on Maya’s part.

While it’s possible to read the lack of chemistry between Emmanuel and Reynolds as a sign of problems to come, it’s not just romantic chemistry that they lack, it’s platonic too.

It’s hard to understand how these two are even friends. They don’t seem like two people who have a decade’s worth of memories and inside jokes between them.

The root of the issue may be in Emmanuel’s performance overall. While she has been brilliant in other things, I’m not convinced this is the right platform for her.

Her scenes lack a certain dynamicism and I think she struggles more than anyone else on the show to play off of her scene partners. I hate saying that but it’s true.

Only her scenes with Nikesh Patel, who plays Kash, are an exception, and even then, their chemistry is not strong enough to sustain this show in the way it should.

I hope the show continues an uphill climb in quality. I am generally rooting for it to succeed, even if I’m not fully ready to root for these characters.

Stray observations:

• We’ve got five episodes left and three more weddings to get through. Methinks the pairings for at least two of those are Zara/Craig and Duffy/Gemma (you heard it here first, folks!)
• It’s still unclear why the setting of this is the UK. There’s no great explanation for why the friends felt so drawn to London that they moved there, and the show doesn’t really take advantage of the setting as much. Based on the plot, it genuinely could take place in any large city, so I’d love to see the show justify its setting in some way.

What did you think of this episode of Four Weddings and a Funeral? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Four Weddings and a Funeral airs Wednesdays on Hulu.

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