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For comedians who came up on social media — or really, all comedians — getting a TV show is both a dream and a potential trap. With a series order comes a paycheck and validation from mainstream institutions. But it also saddles performers accustomed to trading in short, heightened bits with a need to craft long-term narratives with a gravitational center. In these situations, the path of least resistance is to cast oneself as the straight man: the steady one in a sea of eccentric personalities free from having to carry the show themselves. (More Jerry, less Kramer.) Which is a problem when your whole show is about not being straight.
The comedian Benito Skinner is known as @bennydrama7 on TikTok and Instagram, where he posts videos in character as a nosy hairstylist, a chaotic wedding planner, a nightmarish son-in-law and other personae that often involve elaborate costumes. (A slutty Starbucks logo Halloween getup displayed admirable commitment to the bit, even for a professional.) On his ascent through the entertainment industry, Skinner has earned such honors as an appearance on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Now, he’s attained the ultimate symbol of success: a show to mold in his own comedic image, cosigned by ultra-cool production studio A24.
The result, an eight-episode first season for the Amazon Prime Video comedy “Overcompensating,” is modeled closely after Skinner’s own coming-of-age. The protagonist, also named Benny (Skinner), arrives at the fictional Yates University as a valedictorian and football star from his high school days. But before that, we know from the opening scene, he was kid obsessed with Britney Spears and ogling Brendan Fraser’s abs in “George of the Jungle,” until he buried his real interests, humor and sexuality under the weight of social pressure. Benny remains so deeply repressed he doesn’t even seize on the blank slate afforded by college, enrolling in business classes and rushing a frat-like secret society until his budding friendship with fellow freshman Carmen (Wally Baram) starts to pull him out of his shell.
In light of Skinner’s social media work, most of it tongue-in-cheek and gleefully over the top, “Overcompensating” is almost shockingly earnest in its portrayal of adolescent identity crisis. Carmen is still mourning the loss of her older brother a few years prior; Benny’s sister Grace (Skinner’s IRL podcasting partner Mary Beth Barone) has changed her entire personality her boyfriend Peter’s (Adam DiMarco of “The White Lotus”), a douchey aspiring finance bro. All three protagonists suffer from the unformed sense of self that makes 18-to-21-year-olds prone to dumb decisions, like trying to impress peers they don’t even like.
But “Overcompensating,” which was showrun by “Mad TV” alum Scott King, seems to suffer from its own uncertainty about what kind of show it wants to be. There are hints of the more arch, camp show one might expect from a performer with Skinner’s sensibilities, starting with his decision to cast himself; the gap between the quite clearly thirtysomething actor and his teenage character implies a knowing distance that’s only rarely put into practice. This approach is most frequently deployed when mocking the aggressive machismo of Peter and his friends, who punctuate the classic hazing ritual of slapping asses with a paddle by screaming “NO HOMO” and brag about their sexual contests until the conversation devolves into an ape-like chorus of hooting and chest-pounding.
Otherwise, however, “Overcompensating” takes after its protagonist, sublimating its quirkier tendencies for a more conventional front. Directors Desiree Akhavan (“The Bisexual”) and Daniel Gray Longino (“The Chair”) oversee a look that’s only slightly more stylized than the average overlit sitcom. And with Benny, Grace and Carmen each too afraid to fully express themselves, all the bawdy chaos of college gets offloaded onto a single character: Carmen’s horny, boundary-bulldozing roommate Hailee (the mononymous actor Holmes), who’s more of an accent than a model for others to follow. Overall, the vibe is more “Love, Simon” than Ryan Murphy.
“Overcompensating” also seems to take place in a temporal bubble. Skinner is a millennial, and while his show isn’t officially a period piece, it’s deeply 2010s in everything from its soundtrack — “Pure Heroine”-era Lorde, pre-“Brat” Charli xcx — to the seeming climate around queerness on the Yates campus. (Skinner’s romantic partner Terrence O’Connor has worked with Charli, explaining her executive producer credit and not-especially-additive cameo.) “Overcompensating” is careful to note that there is an out community at Yates, and that Benny’s barriers to exit from the closet are mostly internal hang-ups. But that community is largely personified by Benny’s acquaintance George (Owen Thiele), who’s treated as a symbol and foil instead of a person in his own right.
Amid the country’s recent backsliding around LGBTQ acceptance, there could be a topical aspect to Benny’s main conflict. Yet “Overcompensating” feels made more for adults looking back on their youthful immaturity than the co-eds of today, who’ve enjoyed a level of representation and resulting fluency that seem alien to Benny and his peers. The low stakes of Benny switching majors or nursing a crush on his classmate Miles (Rish Shah) are conveyed with a tone that’s neither grounded enough to feel resonant nor heightened enough, barring a few fantasy sequences, to be laughably exaggerated.
Compared to the rich vein that is the high-school show, college has been relatively hard to conquer on TV. For every “A Different World,” “Undeclared” or “Grown-ish,” there’s a hundred “Euphorias,” “Glees,” or “One Tree Hills.” It is, of course, disappointing that “Overcompensating” doesn’t crack the code. But at least it’s far from the first to fail in the attempt.
All eight episodes of “Overcompensating” are now streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
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