Posts from — August 2008

“The Riches” may be the best television series nobody’s seen. Minnie Driver is better in it than any movie I’ve seen her in and Eddie Izzard looks better in civilian clothes than in drag.

But that’s not the point. It’s the plot and the spiky dialogue that gets you. Like many good novels it’s about the American Dream—the one we sell through advertising. But the Malloy family doesn’t get there through hard work or by being born with a silver key in hand. Instead, they are a family of “travelers,” (think gypsies or tinkers) who break away from their larger “family,”which was a wandering band of scam artists who live outside the law.

The Malloys stumble upon the Riches family, who have been killed in a car wreck. So what do they do? They discover the very well off Riches are about to move into an elegant home they have purchased, site unseen, over the Internet—and they simply step into their lives. Then, the fun really begins.

Start your Tivo or pick up the first season DVD. Remember, as Bob Dylan said, “To live outside the law, you must be honest. But then he hadn’t met the Riches when he wrote that.

I missed the first season of “Mad Men,” but this week after it became difficult to avoid the hype, I succumbed. Now I’m hooked.

The series reveals more plot and character development with each episode. It has the kind of story arc you just can’t get in a movie. I also love that it really educates me on how the Golden Age of Advertising got its beginning. The shift was away from account execs running the show to an emphasis on creative. The Volkswagen “Think Small” campaign led the way. It broke all the rules and made new ones.

The show also focuses on how the roles of men and women were just about to change. Non-conformity was going mainstream. “Mad Men” is well written and well acted.

One tip: don’t download it from the web. The Japanese subtitles are distracting and the picture quality doesn’t do justice to its critically acclaimed attention to fashion and style detail. Do the right thing. Rent or buy the DVD.

Watch it on Sundays at 10pm on AMC.