Mare of Easttown (Disnay Hotstar) may be described as a murder mystery but it works more as a drama, or more accurately,
a melodrama. Marianne (only her mother calls her that) Sheehan played by Kate
Winslet is quite a character, holding on to more pain than she can bear after
losing her son to drugs, depression and suicide, going through a divorce,
raising a grandson whose drug addict mom wants him back and handling a
demanding career which comes with crushing pressure to deliver while
shouldering the grief and trauma of others. She has been dealing with mounting
public fury over the case of a girl who has been missing for over a year, led
by the victim’s mother. If all that were not enough, Mare is called in when a
teenager and single mom is found dead. The suspects include Dylan, the father
of her child, his girlfriend Biranna who assaulted her hours before her death,
a Priest with a suspicious past who gave her a ride to the scene of her death, and
Mare’s ex – husband who was buying things for the victim’s baby and is
suspected of being the actual father.
Kate Winslet is
extraordinary. It is refreshing to see a lead actress who has not lived on
celery stalks all her life or been botoxed to within an inch of her life to
give the failed impression of reluctantly imprisoned youth. She looks like her
character – an exhausted woman who does not have the strength to bother with
her appearance or even run a comb through her hair which is mostly scrunched up
into a messy pony tail. The crows’s feet, wrinkles, and excess pounds are
allowed to show and yet, Winslet is resplendent like only she can be as she
delivers a powerhouse of a performance, making the viewer empathize and root
for Mare, even when she is at her most intractable or unlikeable.
Thanks to Winslet
and a wonderful supporting cast which includes the likes of Evan Peters (you
will remember him as the delightful Quicksilver from X –Men), who plays Detective
Colin Zabel, brought in because the powers that be feel Mare needs more than a
little help and Jean Smart, Mare’s mum, Helen ensure that the seven – part series
is never less than engrossing. Both these characters bring in some much needed
humor to lighten the proceedings which is otherwise a bleak, unsparing look at
small – town America devastated by drug troubles, poverty, crime and other
horrors which will always be beyond anybody’s ability to fix.
Yet, for all its
pluses, Mare of Easttown leaves the viewer feeling somewhat unsatisfied and
flat. The big reveal in the end is also not as devastating as it might have
been. Perhaps it was overkill with all the concentrated angst that was packed
into every one of the subplots… So many characters with a drug habit and
suicidal tendencies. So much poverty and unremitting hardship. So many broken
relationships. Such overwhelming pain, rage, grief and bitterness. With young
girls driven to prostitution by desperation and murderers who kill because they
are simply evil and also for reasons that are profoundly moving, it gets to be
a little too much. Buffeted with a relentless stream of distress, the viewer
switches off after a point and a key character’s sudden demise does not have
the impact it ought to have.
With the tragedies
getting piled on, one is hard – pressed to believe that every character on the
show has to deal with so much destructive crap on a daily basis. After all, one
of the biggest issues with life is that too many have to deal with boring
monotony and the sameness of a humdrum existence for too long to the point
where the prospect of sordid drama actually sounds enticing. In Mare of
Easttown though, one character is dealing not just with the trauma of a missing
daughter but is simultaneously battling cancer. Another has to deal with family
trouble brought on by a junkie brother who is stealing from her and scamming
her friend whose daughter is missing etc. Mare’s best friend has to cope with a
cheating spouse, a daughter who has Down’s syndrome and is being bullied in school
and a son who is acting up because he is privy to a very adult secret. You
would think that the writers couldn’t possibly add to her cup of suffering but
they do! The hits just keep coming for Mare and everyone in her life and after
a point it is one too many.
This is definitely
the golden age of television, but I am afraid that a recent trend is that a lot
of purportedly good shows suffer from way too much writing and the result is a
certain gassiness that is hard to take. Character arcs suffer too because so
much mandatory care – laden baggage is crammed into their backstories. But
despite the bloat, Mare of Easttown is worth watching. Because, if I haven’t
mentioned it already, Kate Winslet is in it.
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