Margaret Daniels

Margaret Daniels is a wife and mother trying to hold together a household that is quietly coming apart. An artist by inclination, she is distracted, a little self-absorbed, and often more preoccupied with her own restlessness than with what her kids actually need from her.

Jessi Klein gives Margaret a brittle, weary honesty that keeps her from being just 'the inattentive mom' — you can hear the disappointment she's swallowing under the sarcasm. The show uses her to needle at how parents' unhappiness leaks into their kids' lives, and Klein plays that leak without ever softening it into a moral.