Patience is a virtue. And for multihyphenate Colman Domingo, it’s the key to his success as a first-time half-hour comedy director in The Four Seasons. “The thing I know for sure, before I know anything else, is that I’m very patient,” Domingo tells Tudum.
The actor, playwright, producer, and director has put in the work for decades: He’s written and directed for the stage; he’s been nominated for Oscars, Tonys, BAFTAs, and Golden Globe Awards, and won an Emmy. Throughout those experiences, Domingo has remained empathetic, composed, and most importantly, patient. So when it came time to direct his co-stars in the sixth episode of the season, “Ultimate Frisbee,” Domingo knew exactly how to get what he wanted from his colleagues. “I know that actors will not give it to me on the first take, that they have to feel comfortable,” he says. “You have to let people make their choices, and find their way.”
The Four Seasons, based on Alan Alda’s 1981 film of the same name, follows three couples and longtime friends — Tina Fey and Will Forte as Kate and Jack; Steve Carell and Kerri Kenney-Silver as Nick and Anne; and Domingo and Marco Calvani as Danny and Claude — whose worlds are upended when one of them divorces. By the time we follow the couples into autumn and “Ultimate Frisbee,” we’ve seen how Nick and Anne’s split — and Nick’s quick rebound with the much younger Ginny (Erika Henningsen) — has affected each relationship, both romantic and platonic.
Fey and Forte infuse Kate and Jack with familiarity that stems from their time together at Saturday Night Live, while Domingo and Calvani bring their own off-screen connection to their on-screen marriage: after striking up a friendship borne of casual poolside barbecues with their own spouses, it was Domingo’s real-life husband who suggested Calvani, a playwright and director himself, for the role of Claude. “Marco is just full of life and joy and funny, and he’s very Italian when it comes to cooking for people, and loving on people, and doting,” Domingo says. “I knew we could lean into that.”
Unfortunately, Claude maybe gets a little too doting when Danny is diagnosed with a heart condition. Danny is inherently stylish, as 2025 Met Gala co-host Domingo explains: “I worked with the costume designer to make sure that he was very much a man of the world, that he was like, ‘No one can define me. I wear oversized fits, I wear baseball caps, I have streetwear. You can find me in Paris or Milan.’ I don’t think I’ve ever really seen that with a character like him on television. He’s not a trope in any way.” But his diagnosis inspires an uncharacteristic obsession with youth, beauty, and his own mortality.
While Danny has pushed Claude away, Domingo directs a scene in which a panicked, emotional Danny fears for Claude’s life and is reminded just how much they need each other. Not only did Domingo have to bring himself to a point of emotional catharsis, he also had to direct everyone else to that point, too.
“Colman directing is really a master class in watching someone who is a jack of all trades,” says showrunner and fellow director Lang Fisher, who created the series alongside Fey and Tracey Wigfield. “Because he would be in a scene, crying, but through his tears, directing the other actor in the scene, and then going back into character to continue crying. He would also be keeping his eye on the actual goings-on, and say things like, ‘Is that background guy going fast enough?’ ”
Also in Episode 6, a heart-to-heart between Anne and Kate about their uncertain futures was Kenney-Silver’s “favorite scene to shoot.” That’s in large part, she says, thanks to Domingo’s direction. “No one’s allowed me to do dramatic scenes, ever, or seen me in that light at all,” she tells Tudum. “So that’s a lot of trust that I had to put into a director to guide me, to get me to that place.”
Domingo sat inches away from the camera while coaching Fey and Kenney-Silver. “If most directors asked me if I was OK with them sitting 11 inches from my face right next to the camera,” Kenney-Silver says — well, most directors aren’t twice-Oscar-nominated actors. “But it was without a question. It was actually comforting to Tina and I to have him right there.” Says Fey, “It was just a joy to film that scene with Colman, and to be side-coached by one of our finest living actors. I think he made us all a little bit better at acting than we usually are.”
In the end, the conversation was one of Domingo’s favorite moments, too. “You just want to live in their sisterhood,” he says. “You have the weight and the history of the friendship, and what folks in their 50s are examining — their choices, and who they are, and their regrets, and all that stuff. What I love about the scripts, and also love about this cast, is we don’t have to reach too far away to find this work in ourselves or in our lives. We’ve all experienced these things. Each one of us as actors are probably even a little closer to our characters than we even imagine. We can just access what we know.”
And what Domingo’s co-stars know is that nobody gets them like another actor. Says Carell, “He’s one of those actors that makes an excellent director because he understands everything that actors are going through. Everyone is so calm because he’s calm. If we’re running out of light, there’s not a care in the world. You don’t feel any anxiety coming off of him. He gives great, precise notes, but he also lets you do your own thing as your character. He’s remarkable.”
But for Domingo, there’s no hurry. “I always trust that my cast will get there when we’re supposed to get there,” he says. And, for the record, you can count on him to keep to a schedule: “We never go over time or anything.”
The Four Seasons is now streaming on Netflix.
