During his years of working on the show in Los Angeles, he says, he longed for the "griminess of the stand-up world.
The best things in A Family Romance are incidental to its story, for Author Pollet is far more gifted at showing adolescent innocence than adult griminess.
Ted Morton in CBC.ca Morton said he suspects Manning's interest is not that serious, noting he would have to give up the lifestyle of an academic for the "griminess of trench warfare" in politics.