John Goodman

Lunchtable TV Talk: How to Get Away with Murder is Damages

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As I tuned in for the much-anticipated start to the sophomore season of How to Get Away with Murder, hot on the heels of a deserved Viola Davis Emmy win, I was struck by how a lot of TV is about placement and timing. See, How to Get Away with Murder is basically Damages with much more diverse cast and much better promotion.

Damages had a worthy rival to HtGAwM’s Annalise Keating in a strong, ruthless and tightly wound Glenn Close as Patty Hewes. Both women are conniving, bright, cutthroat and lethal in their own often twisted pursuit of their own definitions of justice. Both have done insane and questionable things. And most of all, both women have very little control over – and are practically unhinged in – their personal lives. It’s in their personal lives that things come apart. The story comes from those cracks in the power-hungry, driven veneer they project. And both stories are compelling and revealed key pieces of information in fragments, so you might think you knew – sort of – what was going to happen later in the season based on glimpses of things you had seen earlier – but not until the final episode would the entire story have unfolded.

The difference… Damages got short shrift, at least from viewers. Damages was intense and critically praised, but never found an audience. It was technically cancelled, in fact, after FX decided to get rid of it after three poorly performing seasons. It was given a two-season reprieve via a deal with DirecTV (which also revived the loved and lauded Friday Night Lights after NBC wanted to cut it short). With the way it moved around, it certainly never found its footing, and was gone too soon despite stellar casting and tight stories for all five of its seasons. In addition to the formidable Glenn Close, Damages featured Rose Byrne, Timothy Olyphant (the one and only from both Deadwood and Justified), David Costabile (increasingly visible all the time in all manner of shows, from Flight of the Conchords to Breaking Bad, from Suits to the rather irritating and cancelled Dig, from Ripper Street to Low Winter Sun), Janet McTeer (love her and sad her recent show, Battle Creek, was cancelled so soon), Ted Danson, Lily Tomlin, John Goodman, William Hurt, the ubiquitous
Željko Ivanek, Ryan Phillippe and the leader of the John Hannah School of English Elocution, John Hannah.

When I binge-watched the compelling first seasons of HtGAwM, it felt familiar in many ways because it covered a lot of the ground Damages had already tread. It was still fresh because it has its own story and feel, but it made me feel regret that Damages was so little seen during its original broadcast (hopefully people are picking it up on Netflix). None of this takes anything away from the magnetic nature of How to Get Away with Murder, but instead, it’s worth stating that if you like it, maybe you will also like Damages.

Lunchtable TV Talk: Alpha House – “One nightmare at a time, girl”

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I have not seen Haley Joel Osment since The Sixth Sense or possibly some tabloid “reporting” on his drunk driving or something similar. Oh the nightmares of being a child star (see “cast of Diff’rent Strokes” for the ultimate case study in child-stars gone awry). Suddenly, though, I started watching Alpha House during a brief Amazon Prime freebie month, and there he was. And noticed that he’s also in the IFC productions, The Spoils of Babylon and The Spoils Before Dying. Tons of great, funny and interesting people in The Spoils, so Osment is not exactly key. But I noticed him most because of his long absence from the public eye – and then his sudden reappearance in a bunch of stuff – referred to as an unusual “second act”. Osment has made no difference to Alpha House, but I had to note the presence.

I plowed through the first season of Alpha House – it did not start out particularly well. I may have had higher expectations because the show was created by Garry Trudeau. Alpha House focuses on a handful of Republican politicians sharing a house in DC together – it’s meant to be a comedy but until the middle of the season, it does not pick up speed. But eventually there are laughs and insights here and there – most of the characters, even though they align closely with stereotypical caricatures of politicians (egomaniacal sex addicts; uber-conservative closet cases; lazy lifelong politicians who have lost their way, etc.), come out as relatively likeable, human people.

John Goodman is more compelling in every single other role he’s played but then he only seems to come to life near the end of the first season – and this may be by design. His character is a complacent senator who rediscovers his values only once his seat is truly challenged. Mark Consuelos… well, does anyone think of him as anything more than Kelly Ripa’s husband and secondarily – maybe – as an actor on whatever soap opera he met Kelly on when they were both in the show? Actually he is better than that, but because he is possibly the biggest stereotype in the bunch it is easy to pigeonhole him as the Hispanic politician relying on his “roots” even though he does not understand a word of Spanish and as the player/sex addict who may destroy his career with these common pitfalls. Clark Johnson plays another of the politicians sharing the house, and he is pleasant and funny – but there is not much to say about him. (I have not seen much of Johnson since his days in Homicide: Life on the Street. Happy to see him, though – love him!)

Only Matt Malloy is immediately and consistently watchable as a very homophobic Republican senator who wins an “anti-sodomy” award for opposing gay marriage when it is suggested at every turn that he is deeply closeted himself. While the “closeted political operative story” was somewhat more highly charged with Cyrus Beene in Scandal during the flashback scenes depicting his coming out, Malloy’s character trajectory is much slower, certainly less exigent. Maybe that storyline is not gripping – almost nothing about the show is – but it grew on me. Malloy has always been one of those everywhere-everyman actors who plays small roles all over the place although I mostly think of him as the milquetoast “Howard” from the brutal film In the Company of Men. Seeing Malloy in a leading but ensemble role is refreshing – and even greater – Amy Sedaris as his rigidly Mormon, wholesome wife. Too much!

By episode five, the only thing that really piqued my interest was the appearance of musician Charles Bradley (as himself). But by episode seven – the prayer brunch episode, which includes the very funny Wanda Sykes (she’s in several episodes) – the show hits its stride, and I finished season two the very next day. (Who turns up, in fact, in the final episode but Josh Pais, the everywhere-everyman actor I wrote about just the other day?)

With no word yet on season three, I am surprised to find myself – after a very slow beginning – hoping it will return.

Scheming – agreed way to proceed

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Every time I go on a “staycation” (hate that invented word but suddenly have occasion to abuse it) vacation, I intend to get a whole slew of things on a long to-do list done. Things start well but if I get derailed in some way (I like routine), I am really derailed, so I spend time reading and watching film after film. It’s for the best because the things on the to-do list are almost always work-related. Why would I spend my vacation working? I have done this all my life. This American work ethic (or insanity) never leaves, no matter how long you have been outside the US. The urge to work, check work email, be engaged instead of tuning out and turning off just buzzes under the skin. I am trying to retrain myself. But it’s difficult. One part of me wants to proceed one way, another part wants to proceed another. My lazy side is winning out because I am just so exhausted on every level right now. Usually I have to scheme with myself

Not that I watch “easy” things. I have watched some challenging documentaries, as usual. I have not just watched crap like the stupid film about Denzel Washington as an alcoholic airline pilot (stupid movie but I liked the small parts played by John Goodman and Don Cheadle), although I did watch that. Mostly I have chosen documentaries like Pink Ribbons, Inc., which also brought to mind the book Brand Aid and the whole idea of “cause marketing”. Or Hit So Hard, a documentary on former Hole drummer, Patty Schemel and her experiences in that and other bands, her drug addictions, her self-doubt and finally reaching some sort of peace with herself. And now Sons of Perdition, a documentary about the FLDS (Fundamental Latter Day Saints – a splinter group living far afield of the mainstream Mormon church and the young men who have left or been thrown off the “compound”. The film chronicles the “Lost Boys” of this group, exiled by the group’s leader, Warren Jeffs (who has been convicted of sexual assault against children in the US).

Most interesting was to see the juxtaposition between an entire family rejecting a member (as in Sons of Perdition) (“choosing between family and what someone else wants you to be”) and a family accepting a member even when she has not completely accepted herself (as it appears Patty Schemel’s mother did when Schemel came out as a lesbian in her teen years). Schemel may not have been completely comfortable with this, but it seems her mother loved and was proud of her in every way. (Naturally we are seeing only what the documentary gives us. I did enjoy Schemel’s mother’s reaction when Schemel was upset that she had made a pass at another girl (something similar), which was not reciprocated. Her mother indicated that there was nothing wrong with the feelings – there isn’t! – but that not much better could be expected. It’s Marysville (a “hicktown” in Washington state, north of Seattle. I know the feeling – I got in trouble for calling my own little Washington town a “hicktown” on the intercom system of my junior high. But for god’s sake – let’s agree to be honest. It was a hicktown!)