44 | MARCH 19 • 2020

DADS’
CLUB
Council of Dads is an
NBC drama that starts
March 24 at 10 p.m.
The lead character,
Scott Perry, is the loving father of
four. A serious health scare moves
him to recruit three of his closest
male friends to step in as “back-up
dads” for every stage of his family’
s
life. These men agree to devote
themselves to supporting and guid-
ing Scott’
s family through thick and
thin — just in case he ever can’
t
be there to do so himself.
The series is based on The
Council of Dads, a best-selling
2010 book by Bruce Feiler,
now 55. He and his wife, Linda
Rottenberg, 54, a prominent busi-
ness consultant, have identical twin
daughters. In 2008, he was diag-
nosed with a rare form of cancer.
Feiler wrote letters asking six men
from all passages of his life to be
present through the passages of his
young daughters’
lives and assist
them. They all responded positively.
Feiler is now cancer-free. Feiler’
s
written about many topics, but he’
s
best known for Walking the Bible, a
best-selling book (2006) and very
popular PBS series about Feiler’
s
10,000-mile journey tracing the
events and places mentioned in the
Torah.

NEW ON NETFLIX
Feel Good, a six-part original
Netflix series, begins streaming
on Thursday, March 19. It stars
Canadian stand-up comedian
Mae Martin, 32. Martin co-wrote
this semi-autobiographical series.
The main character, also called
Mae, navigates a passionate new
relationship with her formerly
straight girlfriend while dealing with
the challenges of sobriety. Lisa
Kudrow, 56 (Friends), co-stars as

Linda, Mae’
s mother. The producers
sent Kudrow a pilot script almost
as a joke. She shocked them when
she accepted the part, telling mul-
tiple media outlets that “the writing
was just so good.”
By the way, Kudrow and the rest
of the original cast of Friends have
agreed to appear in a reunion show
that will be streamed by HBO Max,
a new service. No date out yet for
the premiere.
Curtiz, which begins streaming
on Netflix March 25, is a 2018
dramatic film that played a limited
number of theaters last year and
several Jewish film festivals. The
title refers to director Michael
Curtiz (1912-61), who was born in
Hungary and arrived in America in
1926. He was known as a difficult
man, and there was a famous line
that his accent was so thick that
he was “incomprehensible in five
languages.” However, he was a
very good director who turned out
good films in every genre (including
Casablanca, White Christmas and
Mildred Pierce).
The film covers the production
of Casablanca, which was made
just before and just after America
entered the war in December
1941. Curtiz had to fend off script
interference from studio executives
while coping with a dysfunctional
relationship with his daughter.
Yan Feldman, 46, born in Ireland
and raised Jewish, co-stars as
Julius Epstein (Julius and his
identical twin brother, Philip, won
the Oscar for writing Casablanca).
Feldman is distantly related to
the late, great comic actor Marty
Feldman.

NATE BLOOM
COLUMNIST

The cast of Council of Dads

NBC.COM

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