'Kidding' showrunner explains how a half-hour comedy became the most devastating show on TV

Kidding is making a splash that should be a tsunami.

The dark comedy — perhaps the pinnacle of dark comedies — from creator Dave Holstein premiered in 2018, starring Jim Carrey as a Mr. Rogers-esque children's TV host mourning the recent loss of his teenage son.

"If you ask me in an elevator ‘What’s the show about?’ I really don’t know how to answer that question," Holstein tells Mashable in a phone interview after Season 2's debut. "It’s hard to explain, because the tone doesn’t come across in a pitch about a guy who loses his son."

That tone is everything from crushing loss to unfiltered rage, punctuated strategically with magical realism and cathartic humor.

"The whole show is a bit of a magic trick," Holstein elaborates. "It’s hard to pitch a magic trick."

The pitch stage is mostly over (except to audiences; please watch this show), but that means Holstein and his team are tasked with executing the magic week after week through miniatures, practical effects, and dizzying camerawork. Kidding might be the only show on TV to invite its cinematographer into the writers' room to help shape how the show's visuals reflect its protagonist's expansive psyche.

"I think we got addicted to it after last season," Holstein says. "We learned that that was something we liked to try and we never want it to feel gimmicky, so we let it push the story forward."

The magic also comes from Kidding's enviable juxtaposition of comedy and drama, in which every emotional blow is accompanied by something so ludicrous that one can't help but laugh. The Season 2 premiere featured an entire Mormon family ("They're all flight attendants who work for the same airline!") lined up in matching sweaters while waiting to hear if their brother would even live to see morning.

Holstein says striking that tone is a balancing act between writing, filming, and editing. At each stage in the process, a humorous element like the sweaters must past the litmus test of being a simple gag or appropriate for the show. "It’s like you’re juggling three balls successfully and then you have to throw those balls to somebody else, and it’s impossible to catch them and keep going perfectly," he says.

He acknowledges that the macabre premise of Kidding, something that made it stand out in the vast landscape of TV pilots, can be an immediate turnoff to viewers. "One of the lessons I learned from Season 1 was... if you’re gonna go for the balancing act of pathos and humor that we do, to just maybe try to rebalance it with an eye towards some more comedy."

Season 2 has more classic Jim Carrey, more goofy faces and musical numbers and an entire episode-within-an-episode that takes place in the magical realm of Pickle Barrel Falls. A sophomore season can be freeing even for the boldest shows — look to the second outings of Atlanta, Fleabag, or Master of None, each of which dialed the show's signature style up to 11. Even as he tries to steer the show toward the light, Holstein finds comfort in knowing it doesn't have to be everything all at once.

"We definitely aim for [each] episode to be a different color on the spectrum than the next episode," he says. "We’ll have a somber episode followed by a magical episode followed by a buddy comedy... Hopefully those 10 different notes play together and find some kind of chord."

"It’s like having a conversation with somebody: You don’t want to lose them, so throw everything at them that you can. You’re funny one moment, and then you try to talk about a dead kid the second. It’s a constant balancing act."

Kidding airs Sundays at 10 p.m. on Showtime.