Will & Grace Review: Performance Anxiety (Season 11 Episode 6)

Will & Grace Season 11 Episode 6, “Performance Anxiety” is a small improvement over the show’s last entry but this is almost entirely due to its guest stars, Demi Lovato as well as Seth Rudetsky and Chris Thornton (though to a lesser extent).

The work of the show’s main players, our Core Four, if you will, barely registers. That’s good news for Lovato, Rudetsky, and Thornton. And pretty much bad news for everyone else.

Something about this season isn’t quite gelling like it should. Part of the problem may be that they’re saving bigger twists and developments for later in the season (that’s the only logical reason I can think of why we continue to suffer this Karen-owns-a-baseball-team storyline rather) but another issue is the show’s penchant for reverting back to a blander brand of comedy. 

After all, this episode features a Jay Leno joke. That may have been funny back when this show originally aired, but has no place in 2020. Do the kids even know who Jay Leno is?

But enough about Jay Leno. Let’s talk about Demi Lovato.

Despite the fact that she’s better known for her musical career, Lovato first gained acclaim for her work in television, even starring on her own comedy series on Disney. The woman’s funny and has great comedic timing. She’s a true get for the Will & Grace universe.

That her character, potential surrogate Jenny, is a total foil for Will in every way, is somewhat unexpected, but it doesn’t matter.

Her sarcastic humor and impeccable line delivery more than make up for that lack of originality and her asides about Will’s weird flexing, her faux dreams of seeing a man die, and her similarity to a machine (but with emotions, so a machine in like…two years) are the funniest part of the half hour.

While the concept of her character isn’t particularly original, Lovato’s presence feels fresh and watching her, it’s hard not to feel excited about her potential future interactions with the other characters.

What would it look like for a pregnant Jenny to hang out with fellow mama-to-be Grace? How would she go toe-to-toe with Karen, the only character who arguably has as dark of a sense of humor as her?

Honestly, at least one star of this review is strictly for Lovato.

While I’m less thrilled that there’s a C plot line that relies so heavily on wordplay about being in a wheelchair (again, what year is it?), I will give the show credit on a few points: it acknowledges that people in wheelchairs are sexual beings, actually utilizes an actor, Christopher Thornton, who is a wheelchair user, and manages to raise an eyebrow at the concept of “inspiration porn.”

While it’s unclear to me why Thornton’s character was introduced here or whether he fits into a larger story, he’s incredibly interesting and I hope we’ll have an opportunity to see his character again.

The other MVP of this episode is Seth Rudetsky, an author, radio host, and musical director known best known to musical theatre fans and the Broadway community. His inclusion in the AnnieCon sequence is the kind of winking inside joke that I’d love to see more of this season.

He only has a few lines but he nails them, and even manages to play the piano angrily as Grace tanks a performance of “Tomorrow.” Behold: expert finger-acting to convey frustration.

While almost all of the jokes in the AnnieCon sequence feel a little too easy, the concept is rather brilliant. These days, it feels like there’s a convention for even the most niche of interests or background, so why not a gathering for all the former Annies (as in the musical) of the world?

It follows that Grace would have wanted to play Annie as a child and is even more believable that her mother, Bobbi, would deny her this opportunity.

However, while there was no doubt that Grace would foolishly shoot her shot and compete in an Annie sing-off, it is surprising that she didn’t try to drink tobacco-infused water to sabotage herself once it was clear things weren’t going well.

But perhaps that’s just Grace. You’re never fully dressed without a smile, and I suppose Grace isn’t really Grace if she’s not a little bit delusional and stubborn.

Messing does the most with what she’s given, and Hayes? Well, he’s barely given anything to do. I think I could count all of his lines with two hands.

Overall, it’s not a deeply satisfying episode, but it’s not a bad one and it does earn points for such a strong introduction of the key character of Jenny.

As the series winds down, I hope it’ll reorient and give us more time with Grace and Will experiencing pregnancy and parenthood together as well as focus more on Jack and Karen negotiating their friendship in light of the different directions their lives have taken.

Madcap adventures, sex romps, and AnnieCons have their place, but this show has the potential to mine great emotional depths — and did so beautifully at several points throughout this revival — so I hope it goes out on a high.

What did you think of this episode of Will & Grace? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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Will & Grace airs Thursdays at 9:00/8:00c on NBC.

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