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Month: June 2022

“Gaslit”–“The Martha Mitchell Effect”

This STARZ series, released immediately before the 50th anniversary of the Watergate scandal, reveals the familiar but also the untold stories of Richard Nixon and his circle of subordinates and eventual whistleblowers.  Gaslit takes us back to the divided America of the early 1970s (pending the “end” of the Vietnam War) with comparisons to the post-Trump havoc of 2022.  First and foremost, however, Gaslit and the Netflix documentary The Martha Mitchell Effect peel back the skin on the story of two marriages: how loyalty to a president over a spouse makes...

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“The First Lady” (2022)–Second to None

Three remarkable women, in The First Lady, a  Showtime mini-series (released April 17),  provided indispensable support to their husbands before and throughout their presidencies.  Eleanor Roosevelt (Gillian Anderson), Betty Ford (Michelle Pfeiffer), and Michelle Obama (Viola Davis)–all three made soul-crushing sacrifices, wearing masks of the “political wife” who stands by her man.  Almost miraculously, they achieved meaningful successes on their own, despite the political machinery determined to relegate them to merely decorative roles, a  poise...

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“Tokyo Vice”–Yakuza on Ice

Tokyo Vice, adapted from the titular 2009 memoir, by Jake Adelstein, retells and also fictionalizes the experience Adelstein had as a 20-something  American expatriate determined to be a reporter for the largest Japanese newspaper.  The first episode details Jake’s (Ansel Elgort of “Baby Driver” and “West Side Story)  obsession to  pass  the competitive entrance exam for one of the prestigious internships at Meicho newspaper.  Hired in 1999 into a newsroom with strict rules of journalistic procedures Jake fights the beaucratic...

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“Anatomy of a Scandal”–Autopsy of Privilege

Anatomy of a Scandal, a Netflix thriller mini-series created by David E. Kelley and Melissa  Gibson, is based on Sarah Vaughan’s novel by the same name.  Released on April 15, 2022, Anatomy of a Scandal  takes the viewer into familiar territory: the  “he said, she said” of a rape trial involving an illustrious and powerful political figure. Handsome and elegant British  MP James Whitehouse (Rupert Friend) is a scion of the illustrious and aristocratic Whitehouse family. “Being a Whitehouse means you never lose,” his young son...

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