A rare TV series adaptation that improves on the original

I liked the novel - collection of linked stories, actually, Olive Kitteridge when it came out some years ago but didn't completely warm to it as others did, finding it hard to sympathize w/ the ever-bitter OK and finding Elizabeth Strout's overwhelming interest in darkness and despair - the novel is filled with sudden deaths, suicides, suicide attempts, and the silent suffering of many - to be almost too much: a gorgyle view of life on the coast of Maine. It's very rare that an adaptation actually improves a work of serious fiction but the HBO 4-part series on OK is the rare exception: condensing the novel into four episodes (I've seen only the first two so far) sharpens the story line advances the narrative. The screenplay is extraordinary - full of wit of the rarest sort, the kind of things that smart people actually so to one another, and also unflinching about moments of cruelty, despair, and serious mental illness. The two leads - Frances McDormand as OK and Richard Jenkins at her husband, Henry - are fantastic, bringing these characters to life in a way I've almost never seen in a TV dramatic series: they are deep characters, with a complex and ever-shifting relationship, hard to pin down and hard to anticipate, but always credible. The supporting cast is fine as well, especially challenging as the series covers a fairly long span of time - so we see the characters age and mature (or the opposite) yet the characters seem whole and unified. The director, Lisa Cholodenko (had to look up name) deserves much credit. The series in no way diminishes the darkness of Strout's vision of the world but does make this dark story more more vivid and case-specific by presenting everything through dialogue and action rather than narration and evocation.