Brothers & Sisters Hitting Stride

Well, it's official. My favorite Sunday night show is now "Brothers and Sisters" on ABC. I think it is getting so good that it is making "Desperate Housewives" seem kinda silly. Of all the dumb drama going on Wisteria Lane last night (Why is Andrew being so nice to Bree? He better become a sociopath again soon...this Andrew is booooooring), my favorite part of the episode was Lynette bribing the pitcher at her son's baseball game to give an easy pitch to her son. This was Felicity Huffman at her comic best.
But "Brothers and Sisters" is proving itself to be the real deal. The characters are becoming more sharply defined, the actors are really clicking and at times, even remind me of my family. This is good stuff! Calista Flockhart is operating on all cyliders now and Sally Field continues to be a revelation.

I am, of course, watching to see how my favorite character, Kevin (Matthew Rhys) is being developed since he is the only gay sibling in the family. And by golly, he is being developed in an intelligent and realistic way. What a concept for network television!
When he gives up a date with a cute guy to accompany his mom to a golf tournament, they end up going to see a revival of "Two for the Road" after and run into the guy Kevin blew off....and the guy was on a date with someone else! Later, instead of suffering in silence, he later tells his mom that he would've rather been on that date, "not on the town with my friggen mom!"
Any single gay man with a widowed or divorced mother can certainly relate. It's just assumed that the gay son has all the time in the world to squire mom to events. Good for Kevin for calling her on it.

That said, the chemistry between Field and Rhys is wonderful and laced with humor. At the golf course, when they paired with a truly annoying couple, Kevin says under his breath to his mom: "I'd like to roast them on a spit with apples in their yaps!"
In another scene, when the siblings are trying to encourage Kevin to take their mom to the golf tournament where their late father is being honored, they remind him that he is the one who has ever golfed. He replies that he only joined the golf team in high school "because I had a crush on Matt Brown. I joined every club he was in. I even joined Future Farmers of America!"
Compare this to all the families out there, both on and off the screen, where the topic of someone's sexuality remains the pink elephant in the room. The way its handled here is oh-so refreshing.