Scenes from all marriages

Donald Sutherland was a fantastic "Hawkeye" Pierce. Robert Altman's Palme D'Or winning M*A*S*H* film—an adaptation of Richard Hooker's savage novel—cast Sutherland as a smirking surgeon, detached and too hip for the wartime hell around him.

- RAJA SEN

Donald Sutherland was a fantastic "Hawkeye" Pierce. Robert Altman's Palme D'Or winning M*A*S*H* film—an adaptation of Richard Hooker's savage novel—cast Sutherland as a smirking surgeon, detached and too hip for the wartime hell around him. Alan Alda, inheriting the part in the M*A*S*H* series, one of the greatest American shows of all time, added a splash of melancholy to his martini. His "Hawkeye" talked more, joked more and, crucially, felt more. Both top-shelf performances, but where Sutherland served up a dirty martini, Alda poured one that was dryer and infinitely more unforgettable.

It therefore feels appropriate to see Alda back with the Netflix series The Four Seasons. Written and directed by Alda, the 1981 film of the same name has been adapted into a new series by Tina Fey, Lang Fisher and Tracey Wigfield, and it really works. Alda's film, sharply written and observed, is about a close-knit group of middle-aged friends who regularly meet up for vacations and take turns unraveling. This episodic storytelling device naturally lends itself to the series format, where each seasonal getaway—Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter—gets two episodes apiece.