It's been a minute since we've seen either Amy Schumer or Michael Cera star in a scripted TV comedy series. Schumer's last regular series gig ended in 2016 with the final season of Comedy Central's Inside Amy Schumer. Cera did a three-episode stint in 2020 on the Adult Swim Childrens Hospital spinoff, Medical Police.
Now the two (mostly movie stars) are pairing up for Schumer's new series, Life & Beth. Here's everything we know so far about the upcoming comedy-drama and how and when you can watch it when all ten episodes premiere Friday, March 18, on Hulu.
What's the Life & Beth Release Date and Is There a Trailer?
Check out Hulu's bittersweet Life & Beth trailer to get you ready for all ten episodes coming March 18, 2022.
Who Is Featured in the Life & Beth Cast?
Aside from Schumer, who is starring and serves as executive producer, writer, and director, the show features an all-star cast. Michael Cera (Arrested Development, Superbad) plays John, a local farmer and Beth's love interest. Teenage Beth is played by Violet Young, a teen actor and singer/songwriter. She has also appeared as Candace Clarke in Season 9 Episode 8 of Chicago P.D.
Susannah Flood, best known for playing fan-favorite Kate Littlejohn in the Shondaland/ABC series For the People, plays Ann. The childhood version of Ann is played by Lily Fisher, who will also be playing a young Norma Jean in the upcoming Marilyn Monroe biopic Blonde for Netflix.
Veteran actor Michael Rapaport (Atypical, True Romance) stars as Leonard, Beth's down-on-his-luck father. Stand-up comedian, writer, and actor Yamaneika Saunders portrays Kiana. Saunders has had lead roles on Oxygen’s Funny Girls and Comedy Central’s In Security. Popular standup comedian Gary Gulman (Joker, Last Comic Standing) will appear in four episodes as Shlomo. Longtime collaborator Kevin Kane plays Beth's boyfriend Matt, besides serving as a director and executive producer. Kane has won a Peabody Award, Television Critics Award, and a Primetime Emmy for producing Inside Amy Schumer.
What's Life & Beth About?
Schumer plays wine distributor, Beth. Beth is in a long-term (though, judging by the trailer, rather sparkless) relationship with her boyfriend Matt (Kevin Kane). In the trailer, Beth recalls her boyfriend describing her as, "I always seem like I'm a 100." She's creeping towards 40 and would prefer an afternoon browsing at Nordstrom Rack to a night at the club.
Beth experiences some kind of "sudden incident" that forces her to look back on her past and reconsider what she wants in the present. Beth's story is told conjointly through flashbacks to her younger self (Violet Young plays teen Beth) and to the Beth of today, who has chosen to shake her world up radically and live intentionally on the Long Island countryside. Judging by the trailer, some of that shake-up involves ending her sparkless relationship, looking for meaning in a new career as a girl's high school volleyball coach, and finding a new love interest with a local farmer, John (Cera). But just to keep it official, here's the synopsis straight from Hulu:
Beth’s life would look pretty great on paper. Impressive to everyone she grew up with. She makes a good living as a wine distributor. She’s in a long term relationship with a successful guy and lives in Manhattan. When a sudden incident forces Beth to engage with her past, her life changes forever. Through flashbacks to her teen self, Beth starts to learn how she became who she is and who she wants to become. We’ll go on her journey towards building a bigger, bolder and more authentic life. Learning to express herself and living in an intentional way. A trip down memory lane is a strong source of trauma, comedy and moving forward.
Much like portions of Schumer's 2015 big screen release, Trainwreck, which was written by and starred Schumer, Life & Beth takes inspiration from parts of her real life. She recently told Entertainment Weekly the idea for the story came to her while she and her husband were restoring a historic farm her father had previously lost in bankruptcy. She also credits fellow comedian Bo Burnham's coming-of-age feature Eighth Grade, which captures middle school life's tortured awkwardness as a catalyst in wanting to create the series.
"You really don't see this moment in girls' lives," said Schumer to EW, "and how much it shapes you for the rest of your life if you don't heal and deal with it." Though the trailer for Life & Beth is filled with jokes and funny moments, the series will clearly deal with past hurts, childhood pain, and coming to terms with life's circumstances when you haven't always been dealt a fair hand. It should be particularly compelling to watch a woman's journey to mental wellness and how she connects those dots back to childhood. As a physician—played in a delightful surprise cameo by rock legend David Byrne—tells Beth in one scene, "Sometimes our mental pain manifests in our body."
How to Stream Life & Beth and Other Amy Schumer Comedies
Schumer fans can plan to make a weekend of it when Hulu drops all ten episodes of Season 1 of Life & Beth on Friday, March 18.
If you want to watch other Amy Schumer comedies before the premiere, you can catch all four seasons of Inside Amy Schumer on Paramount+. Expecting Amy, the three-part 2020 docuseries that followed Schumer during her difficult pregnancy while producing a comedy special, can be streamed on HBO Max. And the Food Network's Amy Schumer Learns to Cook, a quirky home-shot cooking show starring the comedian and her husband, chef Chris Fischer, is streaming on Discovery+. Schumer's standup specials, Growing and The Leather Special, are available on Netflix. So there's plenty to keep you occupied before you binge Life & Beth.
Schumer will also be making history along with two other funny women, Regina Hall and Wanda Sykes, as she hosts the 94th Academy Awards on March 27, 2022. The last Oscars ceremony to have three emcees was in 1987, and none have ever seen three women in the role. Of the announcement, Schumer joked, "I’m not sure who thought this was a good idea, but I am hosting the Oscars along with Wanda Sykes and Regina Hall—I better go watch some movies.”