Tuesday, November 9, 2010
NO, THAT'S OUR FACTS. OUR CASE IS WHAT WE DO WITH THOSE FACTS ... WE NEED TO GIVE OUR TRUTH THE DRAMA OF A LIE: Yes, it's The Good Wife by way of Janet Malcolm, a show which asks you yet again to come for the political intrigue, but stay for the violent rodent sex. Sure, Eli Gold's not as smart as he thinks he is (or is he?) and Lili Taylor's around to sing once more about the one who got away, but what I imagine we'll want to talk about is Michael J. Fox's fun role as a devious defense attorney. It's a part which could have gone cliche insofar as we're so used to seeing comic actors play against type this way (thinking of Martin Short on Damages here) -- but still, as always, the writers here have one or two nice twists at the ready. (Also, we may want to talk about the one who got away.)
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Martin Short was the best thing about Damages this season, especially since they didn't give Len Cariou anything to do. Lily Tomlin also played against type, but she was just ok.
ReplyDeleteA news clip about the Michael J. Fox appearance made it seem like he was still being somewhat comedic, even if he were "devious."
The role was, basically, "I'm a lawyer whose going to abuse my status as someone with neurological disorders to take every advantage I can in this case." For a show that's already nicely cynical, it went three steps further by the end this week.
ReplyDeleteYeah, quite good, and nice advancement of the ball on the State's Attorney campaign side of things, particularly for an episode with no Chris Noth. (Though I'm still having difficulty caring that much about that entire plotline, even if Cumming is a lot of fun.)
ReplyDeleteWhat did bug was the entire "this is a test case as part of a class action" concept. Huh? And based on the testimony we saw, I can't see how a court would have certified a class for this sort of claim. Annoying since the show normally does a pretty good job of getting the law/legal stuff right.
Love this show! Tonight's was especially good. Seeing MJ Fox acting again was both a source of delight and wistfulness. I particularly loved the scene where he distracted the jury by struggling to pour himself a glass of water. I'm not an attorney, so I cannot comment on that aspect of the episode, but I thought it was fun, fun, fun.
ReplyDeleteI, too, was confused by whether this was a class action or it wasn't. And in a case involving a wife killing her husband, then herself, in what world do they not see a set of black panties in a man's gym bag contents on a police list and figure out what the hell was going on before using this as the test case?
ReplyDeleteThat said, this is the drama I most look forward to each week (if you'd told me 5 years ago that my TV schedule would befull of amazing comedies and light on good dramas....). I thought Fox was great, and I loved the writing for his character. I liked seeing Baranski in court for once, loved the Eli stuff, love Lili Taylor doing pretty much anything.
However, I absolutely do NOT buy that Eli wouldn't have thought immediately about breast cancer. That was my first thought, and I don't have anywhere near the mind that he does. Is it because he's a guy? I also don't buy that Grace is that clueless about politics.
Did love the Wendy's double-D cartoon - seems like exactly what would have happened, though much more likely in a national campaign than a local one.
When I was counsel in a big-city DA race, there wasn't nearly this kind of attention, but then again our candidates weren't Whoremonger Mr. Big, The Smoke Monster and Lorrell from Dreamgirls.
ReplyDeleteI did think it was clearly established that this was the test case for a class action.
Still, certainly based on what we saw, defendant would have a damn good fight against certifying any class. Class certification isn't terribly easy to wring drama out of.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the final reveal with MJF didn't make sense from a timing perspective--the class settlement would still have to be approved by the court and folks would have a chance to object to the adequacy of the settlement (or to how much Lockhart Gardner is getting paid). I know we have at least one reader who'd be happy to see those issues get some TV time.
Marsha - my thoughts exactly regarding the breast cancer. My mind went there immediately. I thought maybe it was because I have a friend who just had a double mastectomy and is undergoing reconstruction, so it's good to know that it was obvious to more than just me. I didn't think Eli would be dumb enough to not check out that possibility.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about legal stuff, but I was unclear about whether the settlement was just for the daughter or was for the whole class action suit?
Still, it was a fun hour, and give me Michael J. Fox and Lili Taylor in one hour, and I'm a happy camper.
40 million for the class doesn't seem like much, unless it's for a very small class.
ReplyDeleteIndeed: assume it's wrongful death claims that might settle for, what, $6M each?<span> </span>
ReplyDeleteSo - a while back someone used "voir dire" in a tweet and I didn't understand it. I looked it up then and after last night's show have a somewhat better understanding of it, but I still don't understand the original tweet in which I saw it used. Would some lawyer-type-person be willing to explain voir dire to me? And then explain the tweet?
ReplyDeleteVoir dire is the questioning of potential jurors to screen out bias and conflict.
ReplyDeleteOk, so then, how does it make sense in the following, "I just caught myself talking to no one else, for several minutes, beginning with properly saying "voir dire" & moving en francais from there"
ReplyDeletePerhaps the tweet wasn't referring to the actual practice of voir dire, but to proper French pronunciation?
ReplyDelete