Here is your deep dive into the first season of the groundbreaking Netflix comedy-drama. Season one introduces us to Grace Hanson (Jane Fonda) and Frankie Bergstein (Lily Tomlin). Grace is a retired, hyper-controlled businesswoman who built a successful cosmetics line. She drinks scotch, wears starched white shirts, and prides herself on emotional stoicism. Frankie is a free-spirited, pot-smoking artist who teaches yoga, believes in crystals, and cries at the drop of a hat.
sets the emotional stakes. This is not a laugh-track comedy about an amicable split. Jane Fonda delivers a devastating performance as a woman who realizes her entire marriage to a handsome, successful lawyer was a performance. When Grace asks Robert, “Was there ever a time you actually enjoyed having sex with me?” his silence is louder than any scream. Grace and Frankie - Season 1
introduces the show’s signature gallows humor. After cutting up their joint credit cards, the women realize they have zero access to liquid cash. A montage of Grace trying to buy groceries with a personal check (which gets rejected) and Frankie attempting to barter with a handmade pot holder is hilarious, but painfully real. Here is your deep dive into the first
The reaction is perfectly tuned to their characters: Grace smashes a plate and storms out. Frankie collapses into hysterical, wailing sobs on the floor of the restaurant. She drinks scotch, wears starched white shirts, and
Watch the scene where Frankie accidentally gets high before a disastrous art gallery opening. Tomlin’s physical comedy—her eyes glazing over as she tries to explain abstract expressionism to a bored collector—is masterful. Then watch Fonda’s reaction: a tight-lipped, desperate grimace that says, “I am going to kill her with a paintbrush.”
When Grace and Frankie premiered on Netflix in May 2015, it could have easily been dismissed as a high-concept gimmick. The premise was simple: two women, bound only by their husbands’ business partnership, discover that their spouses are not only having an affair—they are in love with each other and plan to get married.