When you hear the phrase “stoner show” you might go for the usual suspects -- Workaholics, Broad CIty, even That 70's Show – but it’s unlikely you’d call up High Maintenance, a show steeped in weed culture that nonetheless works for both smokers and teetotalers alike.
Husband and wife team Ben Sinclair and Katja Blichfeld, who founded the series on little more than a miniscule budget and a prayer, had previously made a career of “getting by” in Hollywood (Sinclair is an actor whose work prior to High Maintenance is littered with character descriptions like “Wild-Eyed Guy” and “Lunatic,” and Blichfeld worked as a casting director on everything from 30 Rock to The Carrie Diaries), before they took content creation into their own hands. The series began as a limited web show in late 2012, with just three five-minute episodes, each featuring Sinclair as “The Guy” (his real name on the series is never revealed), a weed delivery man whose various clients serve as the narrative meat of each episode. Weaving in and out of various characters’ lives as easily as he navigates the cragged Brooklyn streets, the couple has likened the show’s structure to Six Feet Under’s, as each episode begs the question “how will this person inevitably cross paths with The Guy?”
But the show isn’t just about stoners – the “maintenance” here can mean everything from keeping up a habit to just “maintaining” some form of stability – the show is based in the chaos of New York City, after all. The DNA of the city (specifically Brooklyn, where The Guy spends most of his time) is crucial to the series’ off-kilter charm, which gleefully skewers millennial culture and Brooklyn snobbiness with concise dialogue and an almost painfully specific point of view. After six “seasons” of webisodes, Sinclair and Blichfeld are migrating to the big leagues – HBO will premiere the show’s seventh season this Friday night, and roll out six full-length episodes throughout the fall.
Despite the fact that no episode runs the traditional length of a television comedy, six seasons is still certainly a lot of content, so if you’re looking for the quickest way to catch up, here are all the crucial episodes to catch before the premiere, which you can watch in 60 minutes or less, and all of which are available on HBO Go/Now. Hey, delivery men aren’t the only ones with a schedule to keep.
"Jamie"
A prime example of an early High Maintenance effort is “Jamie,” which leans significantly more on humor than the intensive storytelling Sinclair and Blichfeld would embrace later. Centering on two NPR bag-toting, Fleet Foxes-listening 20-somethings whose collective idea of rebellion is to make their own kombucha at home, Sinclair and Blichfeld track the pair’s collective meltdown when they discover an unwanted but mortally wounded mouse in their apartment. And while some episodes are named after the unique clients The Guy visits, this one is named after that mouse – ”Jamie” – a name that the soft-hearted girls bestow upon the doomed critter. Inevitably, the pair order weed to quell their anxiety, and things get even more off the rails as The Guy arrives. Pam is sprayed, tears are shed, cast-iron pans are wielded, and one of High Maintenance’s best episodes is minted.
Best Moment: Our two freaked-out apartment dwellers lie wide-eyed on their couch, blasting Bon Iver’s ‘Skinny Love’ to drown out the sounds of the mouse screaming in the kitchen.
Supplemental: “Heidi” - The other highlight of High Maintenance’s first season is “Heidi,” a skewering of internet dating culture with a long, hilarious con that would be cruel to spoil here. Suffice to say that if a string of unsuccessful dates have left you feeling more like a supper club than a viable dating partner, this is the episode for you.
"Helen"
It only took until Season 2 for for High Maintenance to get serious, but boy, does “Helen” hit like a ton of bricks. Centering on an agoraphobic young man and his bedridden mother, the episode plays out entirely among the confines of an over-stuffed, underlit apartment, as our central character goes about his day, accepting deliveries of groceries and ordering shirts online to keep his insular world buzzing. He calls The Guy under the pretense of ordering weed for his ailing mom, but it isn’t until the casual weed drop-off becomes a desperate ploy to keep The Guy inside the apartment for as long as possible that we quite bear witness to his total crushing loneliness. This one easily checks the “heart-breaking” box.
Best Moment: Some of “Helen’s” biggest payoffs are discovering the namesake of the episode – our main character has a loving obsession with Helen Hunt; which Blichfeld and Sinclair illustrate by stuffing the apartment with countless lovingly made portraits of Hunt ranging from the quite good to the downright unsettling.
Supplement: “Olivia” - Not nearly as distressing as “Helen,” “Olivia” is a fantastic deep-dive into the lives of some of the worst people you almost definitely know, as The Guy is drawn into the vacuous lives of two Williamsburg dwellers with a serious case of misanthropy. It’s acridly mean but oh, so good.
“Brad Pitts”
It was perhaps inevitable, considering one of the most popular uses of weed (besides recreational) is for cancer treatment, that one episode would take on the ailment. What wasn’t inevitable was how much care Sinclair and Blichfeld would take in getting there. Birgit Huppuch stars as Ellen, a cancer patient suddenly left without pain-mitigating medication for over two weeks due to a gap in her health care. Nauseous all the time and unable to eat, she opens up to a friend who, despite her charming middle age, becomes intent on getting her a very different kind of medicinal assistance. The Guy arrives at their apartment, and politely rolls them a joint as they look on with wide-eyed anticipation and a little bit of nerves, but it isn’t until after he leaves that the party really gets started.
Best Moment: “Brad Pitts” most succeeds when the two finally imbibe, a payoff which bucks expectations (and delivers troves of giggles) in the process.
Supplemental: “Jonathan” Marking the first use of a bona fide celebrity on the show, “Jonathan” follows comedian Hannibal Buress on the road during a comedy tour. Eventually, “Jonathan” takes a melodramatic turn that doesn’t necessarily stick its landing, but it’s an episode that’s well worth the ride.
“Rachel”
Adding Dan Stevens to any ensemble almost always immediately improves upon it, and High Maintenance is no different. Cast in the series after writing a heartfelt rave to Sinclair and Blichfeld, Stevens appears as a stay-at-home father with a serious case of writer’s block and a penchant for well-tailored women’s dresses, whose general malaise has begun to put a strain on his relationship with his wife (played by Blichfeld, in a rare cameo). Spending his days in women’s designer duds and puffing away at his weed stash, he eventually calls The Guy, intentionally answering the door without changing his stylish appearance. “Rachel,” which refers to Rachel Comey, the designer who provided Stevens’ apparel, pulls off the still hush-hush topic of cross-dressing with aplomb, seasoned normality and grace, all the while still lobbing pitch-perfect jokes with ease.
Best Moment: After a long day of miscommunication and frustration, Blichfeld’s character returns home to Stevens, the pair of whom connect in a surprising and altogether lovely way.
Supplemental - “Matilda”: With a point of view far more sprawling than an average episode, “Matilda” casts Sinclair’s real-life niece as an inquisitive, authentically oddball visitor in The Guy’s life as he shows her around the city (with varying degrees of disaster). You’d be hard-pressed to find an episode of the series more warm, charming, and utterly New York.
“Sabrina”
The final episode of High Maintenance before its HBO collaboration is “Sabrina,” a rare and rule-breaking episode that sends The Guy away from the Brooklyn streets to a stylish vacation home upstate New York as he joins a weekend trip with a few of his clients and their friends. But what was intended as a happy-go-lucky getaway quickly becomes a pressure cooker as long-held frustrations about one another begin to slip to the surface. In an attempt to save the weekend (and because it is High Maintenance, after all), the group ingests a staggeringly large dose of mushrooms on the final day, which brings with it the usual epiphanies and gloriously funny hijinks. Factor in a fantastic end-of-episode zinger that keeps everything from getting too saccharine, and you’ve got a perfect capper for your mini-High Maintenance binge.
Best Moment: Mushrooms + Tinder. Need I say more?
Supplemental - “Qasim” Another high-concept episode, “Qasim” traces what should be a simple boy meets girl story with a cult-y twist. Perhaps the most “out there” of High Maintenance’s current roster, it earns points for pure imagination and a high “WTF” quotient.