While Euphoria arguably failed characters like Cassie and Kat this season with degrading arcs or stories that felt unfinished, it thankfully allowed Lexi to get the round of applause she's deserved. But that's what makes it so striking-for the characters in the audience, it's just as dizzying, as they're seeing their lives entirely intertwined with what's on stage. At times the episode can be confusing, given how it cuts between reenactments and reality, even the events that took place right before showtime. The audience watches with trepidation (besides Lexi's mom, who gives big Amy Poehler in Mean Girls energy), until Maddy says aloud, "Wait, is this fucking play about us?" The past several years of their lives are then replayed back to them to astounding detail, from "Grace's" insecurity that developed when "Hallie" went through puberty, their father's sudden absence, to the moment Maddy moved in with them and their first loves. Lexi narrates the production as Grace and introduces Hallie, Marta, Luna, and Jade-all dead ringers for Cassie, Maddy, Kat, and Rue. Beginning with the moment Lexi felt her adolescence start to change-when she realized Rue had developed substance abuse following her father's death-her play chronicles her high school experience, and therefore everybody who's close to it, too. Rather than seeing hay bales on stage, it's a recreation of Rue's bedroom. So when the curtain finally rises in "The Theater and Its Double," it comes as a surprise to Cassie, Kat, Maddy, and co. Because they rarely pay attention to her at all, there was no way that they would put much energy in the material that she was writing, casting, and practicing. Lexi first tells her friends and sister that she's putting on Oklahoma! so that they don't suspect she's writing a show based on their lives. Although it's unclear how a high school auditorium could ever have the facilities to execute her Tony-worthy stage show, the way it unfolds is a testament to the series' nuanced approach to storytelling. Lexi's play, which unfolds throughout nearly the entire length of the episode and is intercut with Lexi's memories and reenactment taking place on the East Highland auditorium stage, is one of the most innovative things Euphoria has done to date. Lexi finally got her moment to shine this season, leading right up to the school performance of her play in Episode 7, "The Theater and Its Double." With her original production, Lexi finally stepped into the spotlight, revealing to everybody in her life who used to look past her that she has a story worth telling. And if she seemed committed to being her own person then (who could ever forget when she dressed up as Bob Ross on Halloween?), Season 2 is proving just how much of an ambitious, sensitive individual she is. In Season 1 of Sam Levinson's HBO drama, even as she and Rue ( Zendaya) drifted apart, she continued to stand by and support her former best friend. Maude Apatow's Lexi Howard has quietly always been one of the most interesting characters on Euphoria.
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