‘I never understood the hate’: behind the scenes on Emily in Paris, TV’s guiltiest pleasure

The chirpy comedy-drama was a lockdown hit despite a snooty response from critics and Parisians alike. As it returns for season four, we go on set to meet the people making TV’s most divisive show

When Emily in Paris first appeared on television screens during that long pandemic winter of 2020, it was as though a bright bird had flown into a staid dinner party that had gone on for too long. There was excitement; there was glee; there were a great number of feelings about the garishness of the bird. The series, created by Darren Star of Sex and the City fame, follows a young woman from Chicago (Lily Collins) who moves to Paris to work at a PR firm, and offends her French colleagues with her good-natured midwestern cheer and American insistence on working hard.

The show was critically panned and piled on across social media. People pointed to the ludicrousness of the plot (Emily becomes a successful influencer by posting pretty boring photos on Instagram, like “When you dropped your crêpe, #ohcrêpe”); its painfully obvious depiction of Paris, all pains au chocolat and hot chefs and parties in front of the Eiffel Tower and, perhaps most divisive of all, her outfits. (Vogue writer Raven Smith: “The way her ensembles are put together cheese-grates my eyes.”)

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