The People v. O.J. Simpson is so tightly plotted, and its themes so varied and nuanced, that it could stand as a compelling work of fiction. The fact that all of this actually happened, more or less as FX presents it, is what makes it such compelling television. That, and the sheer level of talent on display both behind and in front of the camera. What first began as a curiosity has become appointment television.
The reason – or one of them – that this show works so well is that it doesn’t feel like a Ryan Murphy show. Murphy directs this episode as smartly as he did last week’s, and never gets in his own way. He trusts in his story and his actors, and in freeing himself in such a way, is able to make confident, gutsy TV. The scenes in O.J.’s Bronco are some of the tensest I’ve seen in a while.
Performances are solid as always, even though we don’t get enough Sarah Paulson, but this hour really belongs to David Schwimmer. Schwimmer has set himself apart from his other Friends alumni by not going the sitcom or rom-com route after that show’s cancellation; this oddball career trajectory means that we don’t bring any of the baggage to his portrayal of Robert Kardashian that we would if he were played by someone who had been doing comedy for the past ten years (think of the reaction to Vince Vaughn as the heavy in True Detective). My favorite shot of “The Run of His Life” was Kardashian sitting in his car, silently breaking down not only because he thinks his friend is dead, but because he has to break the news to the Simpsons. It’s a powerful, intimate moment that Schwimmer absolutely nails.
(Unfortunately, Schwimmer is playing a Kardashian, which leads to my least favorite moment of the episode. At a press conference hosted by Robert Shapiro, a reporter asks Kardashian to spell his last name. Cut to the four little Kardashians, already thrilled at the sight of one of them on TV, spelling the name and then chanting “Kardash-i-an! Kardash-i-an!” This felt like the biggest “Ryan Murphy” moment of the show so far. There is absolutely no need for little Kim, Kourtney, Khloe, and Rob to be on The People, but I’m guessing Murphy, a human BuzzFeed listicle, really wants to get invited to Kimye’s vow renewal.)
Schwimmer’s is by far the most sympathetic portrayal of a lawyer on this show (my guess is because he’s a Kardashian first and a lawyer second). I still have no idea what exactly John Travolta is doing, but at the very least he’s steering into the skid and playing Robert Shapiro like the self-aggrandizing, name-dropping schmuck he is (tonight he’s mentioning that he got one of the Menendez brothers to come back from Israel). As for the DA’s office, Gil Garcetti and Marcia Clark are worried that O.J.’s highway chase will make them look like morons. It’s a little on the nose, given how absolutely inept the Simpson case made the DA’s office look by the end (Tina Fey played an incompetent lawyer who just so happened to look like Clark on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and that was last year).
By far the most interesting, and potentially nefarious, is Courtney B. Vance as Johnnie Cochran. We saw in last week’s premiere that Vance excels at mimicking Cochran’s theatricality and speaking style, but in “The Run of His Life” we get to see the true extent of his self-interest and manipulation. Seeing the outpour of support for O.J. from the black community at large, Cochran is suddenly very interested in the case, appearing on TV to compare O.J. to any number of innocent black men framed or murdered by the LAPD. Last week he was calling the case a “loser”; now that he has an angle, a means by which to manipulate and control a jury, he’s looking for a payday.
Themes of race and celebrity – how they interact, how they contradict each other – abound in fascinating ways. The LAPD clears the entire freeway for O.J., leading one lawyer to complain about the traffic on Sepulveda (accurate, because Angelenos love talking about streets, and traffic on Sepulveda is always bad); later, when arriving back at his house, he gets a gun pointed at him when a cop sees O.J. holding framed pictures and assumes he’s armed. This is a case that could only happen in LA – at least, it could only happen the way it did in LA. The LAPD is known (rightfully so) for being inordinately tough on black citizens, and not even bothering to hide its institutional racism; the Los Angeles DA is known (rightfully so) for being notoriously light on celebrity criminals. How, then, can the two coexist? O.J.’s crime forced an entire city to take a long, hard look at itself. That sounds like it would make boring television – but as The People v. O.J. Simpson proves, it’s riveting.
A Few Thoughts
- First, an apology. In my review of last week’s premiere, I called the episode “The Sins of the Past.” Turns out the actual episode title was “From the Ashes of Tragedy.” It’s since been fixed, but I swear to fucking God the episode preview on Xfinity had the title “The Sins of the Past.”
- Something else that was a little too on the nose: Gil Garcetti lamenting that he was going to run for mayor. (Garcetti’s son Eric is the current mayor of Los Angeles.)
- “We’re not cheering for O.J., we’re booing the LAPD.”
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