We need to talk about the wigs in “Divestment,” guys. The Americans has used wigs and disguises to great effect since day one, and sometimes they’re hilarious, like they are in this installment. Phillip is dressed like a Sunset Strip heroin addict and Elizabeth looks like the girl with the dragon tattoo, but the humor possible there is undermined by the brutality of their interrogation of the South Africans. Director Dan Attias, an Americans vet, makes “Divestment” both riveting and occasionally brutal. It’s a hell of an episode.
Interrogation is a big theme here. Phillip and Elizabeth, along with anti-Apartheid South African Ruben Agobo, have Eugene Venter and his accomplice Todd in their custody, and neither of the two captives are having an easy go of it. Since we’ve heard way more about Eugene than we’ve seen of him, he remains more or less a cipher, but Todd is a little more relatable. His fear and his youth are very real – he’s only a few years older than Paige, after all – and we’ve seen more than a few people cross the Jennings’ path who are in way over their heads. Turns out Eugene wanted Todd to plant a bomb at George Washington University. Of course, this is only revealed after Ruben gives Eugene the South African Raincoat, a term I just made up for putting a tire around someone’s torso and lighting the person on fire. Even Elizabeth marvels: “That’s a bad way to die.” Maybe so, but it’s a hell of a visual.
Martha’s not having a great time, either. Walter Taffet, a role that seems like it was originally written for Denis O’Hare, is quite a pain in the ass. He’s dogged and relentless, and his presence has suitably shaken up the office. Taffet shares a wonderfully tense scene with Agent Aderholt, staged perfectly by Attias. Taffet knows that Aderholt didn’t place the bug in Gaad’s office, but his power of suggestion is so quietly insidious that I think even Aderholt himself was starting to have doubts. Taffet isn’t exactly menacing, but he could nonetheless spell doom for a lot of people, starting with Martha. She finally starts to wise up to “Clark,” which only took three seasons. I kid, Phillip is a liar and probably a sociopath, and Martha just happened to have the access he needed. “Who are you?” she demands of her husband, and once more she’s fed nothing but platitudes and lies.
The only thing left to do is catch up with Nina Sergeevna, who for all intents and purposes is starring on her own spin-off, like a show within a show about a plucky gal trying to lie and seduce her way out of a gulag. For her work getting a confession out of Evi, she gets new accommodations and a new offer: find out what the scientist Anton Baklanov (who Phillip repatriated last season) is hiding, and you can go free. Anton proves a harder nut to crack, and he might be the only person in any world who wouldn’t fall victim to Ahnet Mahendru’s charms. So far, Nina has existed on the periphery of The Americans‘ third season, save for a few conversations between Stan and Oleg, but that’s actually something I’m okay with. The character is too rich, and Mahendru’s performance too great, for her to have been hung for treason. Put another way, Nina is so savvy that she got sent to a Russian prison for treason and is on the verge of getting out in less than a year.
By using interrogations as a framing device, Dan Attias is able to get to the core of what The Americans is about: the nature of truth.
A Few Thoughts
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Paige is doing some research into Gregory. She really seems to admire him, and I’d bet that that will be Elizabeth’s “in” to recruiting her daughter
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Elizabeth is trying to get Philip’s son Misha out of Afghanistan. How sweet
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