Thursday, July 23, 2020

Rake

I've latched onto another TV series via Netflix, this one from Australia that follows the comings and goings of a likeable enough lawyer who is governed by his runaway impulses that see him dressed somewhat shabbily due to the blood that always seems to be on his shirt, courtesy of a professional beating administered by loan shark collectors, who pull their punches just enough so that Cleaver Greene only lands in the ER, rather than as inpatient attached to pulleys.

The series is Rake. An expensive wardrobe would be redundant, since as a lawyer in Australia, the courts look like those in England: powdered wigs, robes, white silk neckwear, and plenty of 'learned' being uttered.

Cleaver of course is a hopeless case for the institution of marriage, but all the women seem to forgive whatever might be exasperating about him. (All except his own family.) He's on good terms with his ex-wife, a psychologist/therapist who knows him better than he knows himself, and whom he consults from time-to time.

Their marriage produced a son, Fuzz, who is now 15, and who is crashing through puberty with a sexual relationship with his 28-year-old English teacher, (the "girl" in his class, as he put it to his father) a cute woman who wears glasses because she's smart and quotes Shakespeare, but who, even with glasses, doesn't see anything wrong with banging a 15-year-old. They both feel they'll work it out.

At least there are no scenes depicting the banging, since that would amount to the producers showing statutory rape. But there is plenty of allusion to the affair, and when it seems to have been ended because of parental confrontation with both Fuzz and the teacher, Cleaver's wife Wendy detects it is still going on because Fuzz, (who lives with her, naturally), "hasn't been staining the sheets or emptying the tissue box," a sure sign to the attentive mother that he's getting it outside his imagination. She's right, by the way.

Each episode is its own story, always revolving around a case, usually sexual in origin, but not always. For all his outward unmade-bed appearance, Cleaver is actually a very good lawyer who wins seemingly hopeless cases, even when he doesn't think he has a chance. He sometimes regrets winning when he learns things later on, but there is that thing that prevents what is known as double jeopardy. He becomes miserable for a while.

Cleaver's impulses lead him to gambling, snorting cocaine, drinking and bedding a select array of attractive women, who he sometimes even pays to be in the company of.

One such prostitute, a smashing 5'10" young woman named Missy, leaves the oldest profession to go to law school. This upsets Cleaver greatly, but they still see each other frequently, and not always sexually, since they're really in love with each other and seek each other's counseling.

A running theme outside of sex is that Cleaver is having to make periodic court appearances as to why he hasn't produced his business records that have been subpoenaed by the tax lawyer, a lawyer who by the way takes up with Missy, not knowing anything about her prior form of employment.

Cleaver keeps gaining postponements by reciting an array of mishaps that have happened to the records that make them difficult to retrieve. The excuses are spectacular. They have been subjected to floods, fires and building collapses, sometimes simultaneously. They have all but been mistakenly placed in a rocket launched toward the space station, but then again, I haven't seen all the episodes.

Woman can't stay mad at Cleaver for very long. This is proved by one scene that sees his favorite prostitute joining the good friend's wife who he slipped up on and had a very recent one-night stand with, and his former wife, who have through incredible timing all converged into his sloppy apartment in the early hours to talk, but who have now become too tired to do even that, and have all sought a good night's sleep under the same duvet. All without any hanky-panky going on. Cleaver can only stare in wonderment at what he sees as his good fortune.

In real life, I really wouldn't want to have Cleaver's lifestyle. He is definitely burning the candle at both ends.

But he is fun to watch.

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