The protagonist is lawyer Patty Hewes, who specializes in bringing class action suits against white collar criminals – industrial polluters and stock swindlers. She's a passionate and fearless advocate for the little guy, but hercutthroat techniques and underhanded methods rival those of her corporate adversaries. Put her up against any Wall Street manipulator or toxic waste dumper or pharmaceutical poisoner, and then hold your breath for the most intense cage match you’ve ever witnessed.
Although the series has it all – great acting, directing, editing, music – it’s the writing that continually knocks me off my couch. The labyrinthine plot is impossible to follow unless you’re paying rapt attention, but when was the last time a TV show made you want to do that? I don’t think I could follow the story without frequently rewinding to see what just whizzed past me.
(Very little of the drama actually takes place in a courtroom. Most of it is a behind-the-scenes chess game played out between the plaintiffs’ and defendants’ attorneys and their investigators.)
Patty Hewes is a fascinating, complex character – someone who is capable of charming the pants off of you one minute and publicly humiliating you the next, with only the slightest shift in tone or gaze. (Props to Glenn Close for her nuanced performance.)
In the pilot, there’s a ten-second exchange of dialogue that gives you an immediate sense of Patty’s character. It's the kind of pitch-perfect writing I’m talking about.
Her firm is up against a charismatic business tycoon played by Ted Danson who's pulled an Enron-style scam. He dumped his company’s stock right before it tanked, enriching himself to the tune of billions while bankrupting the employees who’d invested all of their retirement funds in the company.
The law office is in an uproar as a deadline approaches. The camera tracks down the bustling hallways where we see associates shouting at each other in passing, exchanging documents, engaging in rapid-fire discussions about points of law. Through a glass wall, there's a lawyer talking on the phone wearing only a white Oxford shirt and blue boxer shorts. Seconds later his suit is delivered in a dry cleaning bag.
Patty is pacing the camera in her own tailored suit and striped shirt, her short blond hair perfectly coiffed, accompanied by a young male associate who’s breathlessly attempting to brief her as they zip along. He makes a passing reference to his girlfriend, and without missing a beat, Patty responds—
PATTY: Your girlfriend? I didn’t know you had a girlfriend.
ASSOCIATE: Yeah, she’s a teacher at your son’s school.
PATTY: I thought you were gay.
Then the two of them dash off-screen before the associate can even react.
***
What do we learn about Patty in that short exchange? We learn that...
1) She knows nothing about the personal lives being sacrificed by her associates, who are virtually camping out in the office in order to win the case of her career;
2) She knows nothing about the staff at her own son’s school; nor does she seem to care;
3) She’s blunt to the point of rudeness, but seems unaware of the fact (or again, simply doesn’t care).
It took a mere ten seconds to provide this tightly focused snapshot of a fast-moving target.
But is it the whole story?
Is Patty a narcissist, as pathologically self-involved as the Wall Street criminal she has in her sights? Or is her intense focus, this dispensing-with-the-niceties tunnel vision, necessary to protect the disenfranchised of the world against the titans of industry? Has Patty sacrificed some, or all, of her own humanity in order to protect the powerless?
Stay tuned! I guarantee this character will surprise you at every turn. She’s far too interesting to be nailed down in the very first episode.
And now, thanks to our DVR’s and Netflix, we can all try to keep pace with Patty Hewes, while getting a crash course in great writing.
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