‘The Deuce’ 1.1: Francophilia (And So Much More)

Lucien WD
Lucien WD
Aug 26, 2017 · 3 min read

The central challenge of making a show like The Deuce is this: how can one comprehensively explore the world of prostitution and pornography in a visual medium without unintentionally making something exploitative? It’s quite extraordinary how The Deuce manages to achieve this. The 80-minute pilot to this new series from The Wire’s David Simon and crime author George Pelecanos almost certainly features less actual sex than the average episode of other HBO shows like True Blood and Big Little Lies; this is a story built around sexual acts in a very original, very clever way, and it’s broadly successful in conveying the strain — and the sadness — of the reduction of physical relationships to an industry.

In some ways, the marketable but inessential gimmick of James Franco playing identical twins is below The Deuce: it’s the least sophisticated element of the tapestry, and — at least in this first episode — serves as only a minor distraction and not much of a novelty. Having already seen Ewan McGregor, Justin Theroux, Kyle Maclachlan and Hugh Jackman play dual roles this year, the magic has very much worn off. Franco’s two roles, Vincent and Frankie, are not distinguishable by appearance nor accent, and Frankie isn’t given enough time to develop a fleshed-out personality, so so far I cannot tell them apart. Franco is a much better actor than he’s given credit for, and it’s unfortunate that he’s arguably turned into a pastiche of himself from years of cameo appearances and SNL punchlines. This is his strongest dramatic part in some time, and I’m looking forward to seeing him play with it.

It’s The Deuce’s vast array of character performers who are the show’s real strength, however. Nothing excites me more than a new prestige series full of fresh faces I haven’t seen before; actors whom I’ll grow to love in the coming years. Don Harvey, for example, who had a small role in 2016’s magnificent The Night Of, and resembles an older Sam Rockwell. Margarita Levieva, very impressive in the show’s debatabley-tokenish Moralist Intellectual role (though this is undermined somewhat by an introductory scene of her having sex with her college professor). Emily Meade, who got my attention on Season 1 of The Leftovers, essentially reprises her role from that show as New Girl On The Street, shown the ropes of the red lights by Maggie Gyllenhaal and other more experienced women.

Hiring Michelle MacLaren to direct the opener, rather than some big-name Hollywood man, was an incredibly smart decision: it sounds like a stereotype, but a female director is usually less likely to veer into voyeurism. The script is hard to fault: it’s just the right amount of funny, just the right amount of sad. There’s that typical David Simon Wire stuff: two black men bantering about the meaning of life for 5 minutes straight. But there’s also quiet tragedy: an old white man hires a young black hooker only to show her A Tale of Two Cities, and I found that scene almost as moving as she finds the closing moments of the Dickens adaptation.

This isn’t Vinyl, which I feared it would be, because Simon and Pelecanos are real storytellers who have started with the show’s core and worked outwards. Terrence Winter, on the other hand, recruited Martin Scorsese to a loose premise about 70s rock ‘n roll and coke and guns and only then developed the world of the show. The Deuce feels like a show with a purpose and a message, but I expect it will continue to present these in the most entertaining, yet tasteful, way.

Luwd Media

Keeping You Interested.

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Lucien WD

Written by

Lucien WD

Communications student at Dublin City University.

Luwd Media

Keeping You Interested.

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