‘If anyone’s going to sit on Ryan Gosling’s face, it’s going to be ME.’ So screams Grace, storming from her soon-to-be ex-husband’s house, brandishing a dining chair with Gosling’s face sewed onto the seat. The chair is a ‘joke’ between her husband, Robert (Martin Sheen) and his lover for the past twenty years, his business partner Saul (Sam Waterston), who have finally decided to come clean to their wives, the eponymous Grace and Frankie, about their affair. And get married. ‘Because we can do that now,’ blurts Robert.

These TV veterans – Sheen and Waterston; Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin – know how to inject life into a tired stereotype. The chemistry between Fonda (Grace) and Tomlin (Frankie) has aged as well as they have since their 9-to-5 days in the 80s. Typecast, presumably, for a reason, they nevertheless spring out from their set roles with surprising alacrity, Fonda adding a clip-in hair piece and sad eyes to the immaculately blow-dried, type-A Grace; Tomlin allowing her sage-burning ‘hippie’ real pathos and vulnerability. The romantic coupling between Sheen and Waterston, too, has bittersweet believability. Try to find a Morecombe and Wise parallel in their bed scenes, and you’ll be sadly disappointed.

As you’ve probably guessed, the sitcom label sits somewhat uneasily on a depiction of disintegrating relationships that at times feels uncomfortably real. The first episode immediately dispels any such preconceptions – ‘I don’t remember the last time I slept without you,’ a distraught Frankie murmurs to Saul, a moment seemingly at odds with the drink-throwing frenzy of the revelatory opening scene. Yet five episodes in, and I’m guiltlessly binge-watching away my Friday afternoon. The zingy one-liners from Marta Kauffman (picture her name in the Friends font and you’ll remember where you’ve seen it before) create a fast-paced and addictive script - when was the last time you heard a 70-year-old say, ‘Prepare yourself for some light vomiting, followed by life-altering hallucinations’? Not since Caesarian Sunday, at least.

Never, honestly, have I resented the 15-second countdown on Netflix more. Grace and Frankie is shamelessly addictive, and shamelessly feel-good – a must-watch for anyone looking for a low-commitment half-hour, or three, of good TV. And where else would you hear Jane Fonda giggling, ‘Ooh, I think I just peed a little on Ryan Gosling’?

Grace and Frankie is available to stream on Netflix.

 @juliacraggs