I was certain I’d missed it. After watching the first episode of Fosse/Verdon, the new biographical drama premiering Sunday May 26 on Foxtel station FOX Showcase, a name seemed absent from the credits.
Where was Ryan Murphy?
The guy who over the years has had his name on a variety of projects that dramatised actual events, took viewers behind the scenes of show business, had a somewhat heightened style and showed a penchant for song and dance surely had a hand in telling the story of choreographer and director Bob Fosse, dancer and performer Gwen Verdon and their fraught relationship on and off the stage. I mean, surely.
Nope. But let’s not hold that against the eight-episode Fosse/Verdon, which has more than enough talent behind the scenes to compensate for a lack of Murphy (indeed, there may be people out there who are perfectly happy Murphy’s fingerprints aren’t on this).
I mean, you’ve got Lin-Manuel Miranda and Thomas Kail of Team Hamilton, Joel Fields of the late, great TV series The Americans and Steven Levenson of the Broadway hit Dear Evan Hansen, any one of whom is enough to establish your bona fides.
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And that’s before you throw in headline stars Sam Rockwell and Michelle Williams, doing double duty as executive producers (maybe it’s a vanity title for the two actors, but both strike me as diligent collaborators whose two cents is worth a lot more than just two cents).
Look, even if the bulk of those names mean precious little to you – although, come on, Miranda’s does carry a bit of cachet – simply having Oscar winner Rockwell and future Oscar winner Williams playing the lead roles is enough to get any discerning viewer through the door, especially when they’re given the opportunity to flesh out and bring to life the titular characters.
Fosse accomplished enough in a variety of mediums, and also cultivated enough of a cult of personality throughout his life and career, that he has a bit of brand-name recognition, even among folks whose experience with the legitimate theatre is limited. The same perhaps cannot be said for Verdon, who is revered by aficionados of stage musicals but not as well known by the everyday punter.
As its title indicates, Fosse/Verdon seeks to redress the balance, not only by depicting the pivotal role Verdon played in Fosse’s life, both personally and professionally, but by giving as much space and scope to Verdon as a person in her private and public existence. This is not a story that presents her simply as the great woman behind a great man – although there are certainly and justifiably trace elements of that throughout – but as a complicated human being and artist in her own right.
It’s a good move, even if it does keep Fosse/Verdon at a distance at times – it’s tough to cheer on or sympathise with people who don’t appear to have their own best interests at heart…or, in Fosse’s case, have nothing but their own best interests at heart.
But Williams is a master at locating, excavating and expressing complex, contradictory emotions – she’s done it in Brokeback Mountain, Blue Valentine and especially Manchester By The Sea, and she does so here as well, shifting between moods with smooth, subtle grace that almost doesn’t register until you feel your heart breaking a little bit.
Similarly, the charismatic, casually harmful and self-destructive Fosse plays to Rockwell’s strengths. His own abundant presence and likeability, and his ability and willingness to subvert that for the sake of a honest performance, is a snug fit for the miniseries’ depiction of Fosse, which acts as an interesting counterpart to Fosse’s own autobiographical movie All That Jazz (which is one of the great American movies of the 1980s in its ambition and style, but also a warts-and-all portrayal that still manages to airbrush the more unsightly warts).
Plus, Rockwell gets to dance. Sam Rockwell dancing is like Christopher Walken dancing – when you have the chance to showcase it, showcase that shit.
There’s no doubt Fosse/Verdon isn’t everyone’s tempo – stories that go way, way behind the scenes of showbiz (ask yourself if you’d like to attend a party where the likes of Neil Simon and Paddy Chayefsky are on the guest list – if so, this is certainly the show for you) or delve deep into the murkiness of artistic lives don’t always rack up Game of Thrones ratings.
But if you have an interest in what makes creative people tick or how two people so simpatico in so many ways can nevertheless manage to hurt each other so badly or you just want a bit of dish about the original stage production of Chicago (I know you’re out there!), this is appointment TV for the next eight weeks. Enjoy the old razzle-dazzle, theatre kids.
