Margaux and I don’t know how to make new friends, so we decided to take a look at Steven Soderbergh’s medical drama The Knick.
Trevor: I loved the opening shot of “Method and Madness.” I wrote in my notes that it looked like something out of a Nicolas Winding Refn film, then it turns out that his longtime composer Cliff Martinez wrote the wonderfully anachronistic score.
I was thoroughly impressed by The Knick’s series premiere, and in the way that it wants to examine all facets of a hospital (the ambulance drivers, the nuns, the health inspector) it reminded me a lot of the same narrative tactic used by The Wire.
Margaux: Soderbergh is on a roll since he’s decided to move on from making movies for a living. A lot like Behind the Candelabra, he wasted zero time with what literally felt like throwing you in the middle of the turn of the century medical drama.
Meet Dr. Johnny Thackery, he’s all about the opium den life and, for a channel trying to get away from their “SkineMax” reputation, has full-frontal vadge in the first 15 seconds of the show. Hey, old habits die hard – I think, I guess.
Trevor: That was a good way to hook the viewer. “Oh, those are nice shoes, I – TITS.” I thought Clive Owen was great. Something else I loved was that botched C-section in the operating theater. Soderbergh (who also shot and edited) kept his camera at a tasteful distance, but didn’t try to obscure what was happening. He didn’t use music or quick cuts to mine drama out of the procedure, because the drama was already there. I swear, that guy can make anything thrilling.
Margaux: Dear God, BOTH operating scenes were some of the most disgusting (yet, beautifully shot) moments I’ve attempted to sit through in a while. I mean, I know it’s on paid cable but still, at the end of that botched C-section, mother and baby are both declared dead – you almost wanna laugh cause it was such a tension filled moment. Like, shit – can you imagine failing so epically on basically a day-to-day basis? It helped make Jules’ suicide a little predictable, in a good way, it could’ve been another brutal scene but there’s something about Soderbergh’s restraint that almost fucks you up more.
Trevor: He’s great at little touches, like Christiansen (played by Matt Frewer, aka Max Headroom!) smoothing out the sheet on the couch before killing himself, or dipping his beard in water before operating. I think it’s telling that the suicide is so much less graphic than the C-section. Soderbergh’s direction is very clinical, detached, almost Kubrickian, which is appropriate given the hospital setting, but sometimes it can work against him. For instance, that scene where the little girl has to tell her non-English speaking mother that her TB is only going to get worse? It was a well-done, cleverly written scene, but it lacked the emotional resonance that I think it needed. Don’t get me wrong, though; that’s a minor quibble, and it’s not going to move the needle on my opinion of “Method and Madness.”
Margaux: I actually appreciated the coldness of that scene, the little girl breaking the news to her Mom that she’s going to die in T-minus a week (if that) and her Mother’s reaction is, you’re gonna be late for work. I really liked how a lot of the supporting characters sort of take on Thackery’s perspective on the medical profession, people are going to die in the name of scientific advancement.
Speaking of great writing and keeping with the topic of Dr. Christiansen’s suicide, I thought Clive Owen’s eulogy was a sign of more to come, great writing elevated by beautiful Owen’s wonderful acting. Owen really seems to be enjoying himself as this character too, it’s nice to see him not opposite of Julia Roberts.
Trevor: Clive Owen killed that eulogy (and is rocking his mustache much better than he did in Killer Elite), and I love the comment one of the other mourners made about it being self-aggrandizing. It’s a good sign that The Knick doesn’t intend to put its main character on a pedestal, more evidence of which can be seen in Dr. Thackery’s, um, “complicated” racial views.
Margaux: And I loved that a nun is the person who was the first to quickly point that out. But I agree, I’m not getting the sense that The Knick will be making Dr. Thackery into some sort of medical genius with a minor heroin/cocaine problem. He’s just a regular, run-of-the-mill racist, asshole who will call over nurses, explain how/why they failed, then walk away briskly. Only to get aforementioned nurse to inject him (in da butt) with daily dose of cocaine and never ever say thank you.
Trevor: He’s just a regular-type dude who likes to make terrified nurses inject liquid cocaine into his dick.
I like the racial aspect of the show. I didn’t know that’s where the narrative was heading. Andre Holland’s Dr. Algernon Edwards is a good foil for Dr. Thackery; Edwards is dignified and professional, and won’t stay where he’s not wanted. But he can also swallow his pride, like when he sees Thackery perform that operation at the end with a tool of his own devising, and decides to stay at “the circus.” I like that staying is his idea, it grants Edwards a good amount of agency. Most shows would have Thackery begrudgingly allowing Edwards to stay.
Margaux: Though I question the plausibility that African American doctors were accepted anywhere, I too was pleasantly surprised they decided to take the show in that direction. And I love how they make Thackery’s blatant racism almost eloquent: “You can’t run away and join the circus if the circus doesn’t want you.” I’m looking forward to watching how the Robertsons’ “social experiment” turns out – I don’t think Cornelia takes too kindly to back talk from anyone, let alone Thackery. Plus, fuck that doctor up for Edwards job, he nearly killed the second patient before Thackery saves everyone’s ass with…COCAINE! “What happened to the Labrador?” “I miss that dog everyday.”
I just loved the moment he injected the patient with a low level of cocaine, all I wanted to shout out was, NOW WE’RE BOTH HIGH BUT I’M THE ONE WITH THE SCALPEL!
Trevor: At first I was worried that The Knick was glamorizing cocaine (which is awesome, readers, you should really try it), like Flight did, but then I remembered that using cocaine in medical procedures wasn’t uncommon in 1900. And that bit about the Labrador was good. The Knick isn’t all gloom and doom (like The Leftovers) but moments of levity are still welcome, most of which come courtesy of Cleary, the nun-baiting ambulance driver.
Margaux: “Your ugly mug is responsible for girls staying virgins” – these are not the nuns from my Catholic elementary school. Love a show that gives its supporting cast not only great one-liners but really set up some interesting and shady characters that all play a part in the hospital, yet not entirely sure what their motivates are – besides impure. I mean, if anything, The Knick made me appreciate living in a time of doctors with bedside manner and medical marijuana.
Trevor: Maybe medicine is cyclical, and we’ll see a return to medicinal cocaine. “This patient needs five lines of that good shit, STAT!”
What do you think in terms of star count? “Method and Madness” was a hell of a premiere.
Margaux: I knew The Knick was gonna be good but I didn’t expect it to be this good! It was sort of a pitch perfect premiere, I’d say 4 stars.
Trevor: Really? I was thinking four and a half. I thought it was just one solid scene after another, and my only objections have already been mentioned.
Margaux: In case anyone at Cinemax was reading this, I didn’t want them to get too excited about having a real possible hit on their hands. But I’ll happily bump up The Knick to four and a half because I’ve had a Clive Owen boner since Closer.
Trevor: Cinemax can fuck up a one-car funeral, but Soderbergh will keep everything in check, I think.
Margaux: I think Soderbergh is up to the task; it’s not Ocean’s Fourteen but I think he’ll do okay by this show.
About Author
