Season 1, Episode 1
Date of airing: April 13, 2020 (ABC)
Nielsen ratings information: 2.662 million viewers, 1.8/4 in Households, 0.49/3 with Adults 18-49, 0.3/2 with Adults 18-34, 0.7/3 with Adults 25-54
Teleplay by: Dean Georgaris
Directed by: David Frankel
NOTTING HILL, but in reverse and with Hispanic characters instead of British ones. This is what I got from the first 43 minutes of this series, which might be the thing I desperately need in these crazy and horrid times of pandemics, enraging US politics, wars in Europe, and a life void of love, affection, and attention. While I wasn’t looking for a romantic comedy in a serialized format, having watched the first chapter of one has warmed my heart a little, and suddenly I’m interested in following the whole story of Daniel and Noa Hamilton, as well as all the intriguing and soap opera-like romances they and their friends and families will fall into, since THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY is still a romantic comedy, and it’s all about the romance part of the genre.
Broken up with, all alone (with friends) during a hot summer night, in the need for some friendly company – life has not been fair to both Noa and Daniel, who were going through their own relationship drama just hours before their fateful encounter in a fancy restaurant’s washroom. The higher-ups of this realm had a plan for the two, or rather for Daniel, because Noa was very much interested in starting a pet project as soon as she heard a guy talking to a picture on the wall while relieving his bladder. Both decided to hang out for the evening, to get to know each other, to realize their faults and dreams, and maybe fall in love with one another, as life becomes the opposite of what they have been living lately. It is the greatest and easiest-to-write romantic comedy of current times, and with the viewers needing to stay home to practice social distancing, one could have hoped that a serialized love story gives them something they were probably unable to have for themselves: A friendship on the rise, a romance for the ages (and gossip tabloids), and a story to remind us all that family is important, and family is great to have around when you’re in the middle of a life-changing event.
THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY couldn’t be more of an easy and satisfying watch. If you crave a simple chocolate cookie, you’ll get it with this show (don’t expect the taste of tiramisu though). If you want something of a soap opera, but with more charming characters, you’ll find it with Noa and her band of friends, stylists, and worried managers treating her like she is the center of the world. You’ll find it with Daniel and his family of brothers and sisters and parents who could also be his BFFs, and you’ll find a whole lot of Hallmark Channel storytelling in this show, as the chances were pretty big that none of the drama the characters will be going through as the show moves along is bigger than what most of the characters in Shonda Rhimes’s shows go through.
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| Noa doesn't like to shave, she rather puts a beard on her face. |
There seems to be one issue only in THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY, and it’s how long it will take for Daniel and Noa to get together as a romantically linked couple, to share their first kiss, and for their newfound romance to stir up trouble for their exes and their families and friends, because maybe in this series universe it’s unheard of for a multi-million dollar heavy superstar and a simple baker from Little Havana to become acquaintances, best friends, and then lovers, possibly even a married couple. After all, the premise of a super famous person and a simple person becoming a romantic couple is a fairytale, making THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY exactly that – which, to be honest, was not a surprise when you look at the title of the show, which has already been constructed to remind the viewers of a fairytale. That could be a good or a bad thing though: If you like fairytales and just want the cutesy stuff, THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY will be the show for you, but if you expect drama and intrigue and angry exes who plot revenge for their greatest loves abandoning them for something better, maybe stick with the soap operas – although the chances are good for THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY to also have a few soap opera elements in itself, to be revealed later in the narrative when the overall story arc becomes too obvious and was in need of an upgrade.
This being a Hallmark-friendly fairytale on a non-Hallmark television network, one can expect to find the slightest of efforts in making the show any more interesting than the premise allows. The cast shines under the heavy make-up, hairstyles, and well-formed abs, but no one should ever dream of it sweeping awards at any ceremony or encounter any average-looking persons (to paraphrase Daniel Madigan in the classic 1990s action comedy LAST ACTION HERO, there are no ugly people in this world). And this being a show from the third decade of the current millennium, let it be guaranteed that the writers tried their best to bring inclusivity into the narrative – something the Hallmark Channel was unable to do for racist and homophobic reasons for a long, long time, so here you have an LGBTQ+ character whose sexuality is rather repressed in the narrative, and an entire field of Latinos and Latinas who run the story from the background and give the audience a perspective they normally don’t get or aren’t interested in. That means THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY was never fated to be the ratings hit ABC hoped to have during the COVID-19 pandemic when TV watching became a thing that helped to fight boredom at home. It would make this show a nice try to be something different on broadcast television, but it won’t be any different from the rest of the field when the writers employ storytelling that comes straight out of the book of cliches and romantic stereotypes.
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| Daniel is getting prepped for the ultimate heartbreak. |
Still, THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY is a cute watch, at least during its
first episode. One doesn’t always have to watch grim-reaper television
or satirized lifestyles (I seem to be able to handle it less and less, as I'm getting more and more comfortable with my anxiety and depression), let alone weird people living through a power
struggle on reality-television franchises. Sometimes it feels good to
just have happy and friendly and freaking good-looking characters go out
into the night to find love and come up successful. It’s not only
NOTTING HILL in reverse, but also THE BACHELOR franchise with only two
contestants who are currently going through the hometown episodes. If
you like that, THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY will be your next favorite thing
on television. But like I said before, don’t come knocking at the
writers’ doors asking for depth and seriousness. Or for more than nine episodes, because there aren't any.
