bluecastle | the ugly stories beautifully told.

superb storytelling is superb.

caught most of an episode of The Cleaner on TV last night when I got home from rehearsal. I've seen maybe half a dozen episodes of this show and only those because there was a mini marathon on last monday when I was home sick and it was way better than any of those daytime talkshows on at ten in the a.m.

anywho. I was impressed. the acting... especially in terms ot the guest stars (with maybe the best married people kiss I've ever seen on tv by two people being paid to pretend to be married.)

What could have been a fairly run of the mill story about Benjamin Bratt's character trying to get a recovering junkie friend back onto the wagon became something so much more ouchy and thinky with the added layers. The husband fell off the wagon and went back to booze and pills after his wife was diagnosed with terminal cancer. The wife was an ex-junkie (they all three met in AA) (or maybe NA) (anyway). Meanwhile the wife is both trying to stay clean in support of her husband's recovery ... added to not wanting to go back to using herself, despite her medical need for the narcotics.

So while he struggles to get clean ... she struggles to give up her sobriety in order to ease the affects of her disease.

Thorny. right? Makes for meaty drama. Loved it. And bonus points for having Whoopie Goldberg playing the AA sponsor. She's always compelling.

Some days I wonder if anyone is telling good stories televisually anymore. But some days I don't.