Author: Matthew Groff

  • Late to the Party: Review of “Perry Mason” (2020)

    This is my continuing series of reviews of tv, movies, or music that has been out for a while, that I am just getting around to… As always, there are SPOLIERS!

    I am a sucker for noir films and TV shows. From Sam Spade, to Chinatown, to The Long Goodbye, to LA Confidential, I love noir’s visual style, the dark stories, and also how these noir stories show the dark criminal world that is just under the surface of the cities we inhabit. I will even throw The Third Man in as well.

    When I saw the previews of Perry Mason on HBO in the spring, I was hooked and ready to go. I never watched the original Raymond Burr 1957 television series of the same name, so I had no attachment to anything that had happened in the past, but I was aware that Perry Manson was “the best” defense lawyer around as he could get criminals to admit their crimes on the stand. When I saw that the cast was lead by Matthew Rhys, and also that Tim Van Patten was directing many of the episodes, I felt that I was in very safe hands.

    And for the most part I was.

    We meet Perry in 1932, who at this point is a detective for the lawyer Elias Birchard “E.B.” Jonathan. Jonathan takes the case of defending a mother who is accused of killing her child in a kidnapping plot. It was a very dark subject matter to have the show revolve around, but I do admit that it did create a feeling of uncomfortableness in me for all the characters that are involved in the murder. What also became apparent very early on is that this was going to be the origin story of Perry Mason becoming a lawyer, and his drive to defend people who seemed to be undefendable.

    What I was given was a show that hit all the right noir notes that this type of genre demands, as well adding a very relevant depth to the inherent racism in the LA Police Department, and the indignities black police officers faced. Most of the characters did have backstories of pain that they were still dealing with, or secrets they couldn’t share, or of living lives not out in the open. It created a solid foundation of why all of these very different people would be drawn together to fight for justice.

    The series had a nice slow simmer to it, hitting its marks, and then at the crux of the show, episode 5, after E.B. Jonathan’s suicide, the show starts an awkward sprint to the end. It comes across as jarring and very out of left field. Somehow, with a little coaching, Perry is able to pass the California Bar exam, which I do happen to know that you do not need to go to law school for, and POOF! He’s a lawyer now!

    After a few stumbles at the start of the trial, Perry has no issues to working his way through the courtroom. And when Perry wants to put the corrupt cop who is behind the murder on the stand, he is told that no one confesses under cross examination, but then the show doesn’t put the cop on the stand. A choice that left me very confused. I thought that was Perry Mason’s whole thing. At least let him try and fail, right, as that would be realistic. In the end Perry pays off a juror to deadlock the jury, only to learn that two other jurors also felt the mother was innocent, which I guess was meant to make us feel that Perry did a better job than he thought. It left me with the feeling that Perry isn’t going to become a good lawyer one day, but that he’s just not a good lawyer at all.

    Sadly, it felt like all the pieces are there to make a really good show that is moody, honest, and can be relevant as we examine what justice denied in the past looked like. Perry Mason was renewed for a second season, so I hope that the next time around, with all the characters in place, that they will be able to stick the landing.

  • New Writing Schedule for Fall

    The wife and I sat down and had the discussion about whether we were going to send our daughter to school this Fall. We know that the kid really, desperately, wants to be back in a classroom with her friends and her teacher. We also know that we just aren’t comfortable with the way the world is when it comes to Covid. I also understand that NYC is one of the safer places in America to be when it comes to infection rates, and that precautions are being taken with the interest of safety for students and teachers in mind.

    But, we still aren’t comfortable. And I can admit that this is based off a feeling, and not logic. My feeling is that I don’t want to put my kid at risk. Covid is too dangerous without a vaccine.

    So, we have had to also sit and rethink how we are going to handle the wife working full time from home, a full-time student at home, and this guy looking to steal moments to write. I was hoping that I would have about three hours on days when the kid was in school, but that doesn’t seem likely for the rest of this year.

    I’m not complaining. First, I don’t think I have the focus right now to sit and write for three hours straight. But, most importantly, my number one job is to take care of the kid; making sure she is safe, and gets the best education possible. It’s a small sacrifice to make on my part, and the reward of having this time with the kid is boundless.

  • Covid Blues, But My Wife Rocks

    Just going to brag about my wife for a second…

    She was hired today, for a fulltime job with benefits. She busted her ass and found a job in the middle of a pandemic. It has made life easier for all of us, and we can take a little breath of relief. Maybe only for a second, but it feels like the first breath we have been able to take in five months. I’m very proud of of this amazing woman.

    It has been such a insane and unpredictable nine months for us. From leaving California, and reestablishing ourselves back in New York, only to have Covid pull the rug from out from everyone. There was no way to predict any of this.

    To be honest, I never thought there really would be a pandemic. From the way the world treated SARs and Ebola, even N1H1, it just seemed to me that the we knew how to work together and fight a contagious disease. I really felt like science and logic were winning over ignorance. Little did I know that stupid is stronger than I thought.

    And with all of this, how will we tell this story of disease? That is the question I keep hearing from my artist friends… if we survive. How will this affect the way we tell stories, and how we share this common experience? Only time will tell.

  • Steal That Time to Write

    Last night I was able to get about 500+ words done on the novel. (My goal is 1,000 words a day, but that might be too ambitious.) I had to steal moments to get it done while I was making dinner. The brussel sprouts were sautéing, and I added a paragraph; that sort of thing. It was very scattered, but I am trying to finish a first draft; it doesn’t have to be perfect.

    It reminded me a conversation I had with a playwright friend of mine about setting aside time to write. He is a married father of two, both kids under 10. He is a stay at home dad, but that position does not afford him any additional time to write, as any stay at home parent would tell you.

    What my friend told me was that before kids, he wrote anytime he felt like it. Now, as a stay at home parent, he had moved into a system of taking notes when an idea hit him, and then having to find the time in his schedule to write out the idea. He actually felt it made him a better writer. As he told me, he might only have one hour to work a day, so he knew that if wanted to get his idea accomplished, he had to focus and use every minute of that hour.

    Not that I am at that point, but I am beginning to find this to be solid advice.

  • Coronavirus Downer of a Day

    We are all having a down in the dumps coronavirus day in our home. My wife’s job hasn’t been the most fun of late, and to be honest, remoting into work every day does take a toll on you after a while. The kid had a tummy ache most of the morning, so we passed on going to the park, which, now that her tummy ache is gone, she’s become a rubber ball, bouncing off the walls. I, for my part, got my big chore done today (laundry) but pretty much have farted out on everything else; I have to finish school shopping, and creating a “school area” for the kid as the start of school is closing in.

    I had been hoping that school was going to start in September, and we were going to be able to drop into a normal routine for our family. I have to admit now that it isn’t going to happen. We have to choose, very soon, if the kid will attend classes in the school, or if she is going to continue with remote learning. We have to deal with the very harsh reality that as we don’t have health insurance (the kid is covered, thank God) that sending her to school does create a risk for us to get infected. I am aware that NYC has the lowest level of infection in the USA, but I am still nervous about getting so sick that I or the wife have to go to the hospital. That thought is never out of our minds.

    On a day when things aren’t working out the way we want, it’s easy to start down the path of all the awful things that could happen to us, and then everything becomes unbearably depressing, and the world is coming to an end.

    That’s why I suggest you check out my friend John’s free trivia night, called “Mind If I Ask You Something?” It’s virtual, on Wednesday night, and anyone can play. You can find him on Instagram or on Twitch.