less-than-quickie review: Jeffrey Toobin vs. OJ Simpson...
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Kevin M.
Feb 3, 2016, 3:24:45 PM2/3/16
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... or whatever the f*ck they're calling it. I won't speak to its entertainment value, or the creative/stylistic choices made, or how sympathetic the series is to certain extremely unsympathetic people. I will say -- as someone who earned notoriety for merely watching the trial -- that I could write an entirely new book on the number of things that were wrong in the first episode. And I mean I can get into the smallest details, like the melt-point of the Ben & Jerry's ice cream found at the crime scene, or the amount of traffic on Bundy the night of the murder, or how long it really took for crime scene photos to reach Marcia Clark, or which DDA was actually in charge of the Simpson case, but honestly, I'm not going to bother. I watched the trial 20-years-ago. I wrote extensively about the trial 20-years-ago. Two people are still dead, two children grew up without a mother, and I'm not watching any additional episodes of this crapfest.
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Kevin M. (RPCV)
Jon Delfin
Feb 3, 2016, 5:14:02 PM2/3/16
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Vulture's got you covered.
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Kevin M.
Feb 3, 2016, 5:37:32 PM2/3/16
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Better them than me. I see all this got Marcia Clark back in the spotlight again. As if people needed another reason to dislike this series.
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Kevin M. (RPCV)
Bob Jersey
Feb 3, 2016, 8:19:55 PM2/3/16
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Kevin M., to Jon Delfin:
Vulture's got you covered.
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Better them than me. I see all this got Marcia Clark back in the spotlight again. As if people needed another reason to dislike this series.
Clark was the centerpiece of Entertainment Tonight today, her pain seething through the screen HD or no HD.
Kato, meantime, anguished at the pale-looking gwelb cast as him.
B
PGage
Feb 14, 2016, 4:21:52 PM2/14/16
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I do want to get into the entertainment and creative issues a bit. I will not claim to have watched the OJ trial as closely as Kevin did, but I did follow it very closely - apparently a hell of a lot more closely than the people who made this series. But there are not just factual errors here - though these grate in particular since so much of this is easily available, well known and in the public record. But the creative choices are really baffling.
As I heard about this show I was pretty much determined not to watch it; I assumed it would be a tabloid ratings grab not worthy of much time. Then I noticed it was on FX, a cable network that has brought some of the best drama to television in the last decade. That track record was enough to get me to watch it - I have now seen two episodes (is that all that have aired? I am watching it On Demand and have lost track of actual airing dates). For me, the abiding question about this production is: "Why is it so bad, when it is backed by a distributor which has had such a great track record?" If you told me it was being aired on E! or Oxygen I would understand, but FX? Can this just be a pure ratings payday for those guys?
The amount of exposition they put into the mouths of the key players is absurd, on the order of: "pardon me, I am an angry black assistant DA who is down with his people and skeptical of the LAPD, can you tell me where the bathrooms are?". As cringe-worthy is the number of call-outs to a generation or two that apparently knows and cares more about the tabloid star daughters of Rob Kardashian than his role in the story being told. But what surprises and irritates me the most so far is how much of an apology the series appears to be for Clark, Gil Garcetti and the LAPD. It may be that later episodes will flip this script, but that assumes a minimum level of quality that would keep the rational viewer around long enough to see it.
By the end of that trial I thought OJ Simpson had probably killed his ex-wife and Ron Goldman. I was also certain that the prosecutors, LAPD detectives and Crime Lab and bungled their job so badly that it would be a violation of their oath for a jury to find him guilty based on the evidence actually presented in court in that trial (as opposed to evidence discussed in the media, or presented at the later civil trial). Of course it is tragic when a probably murderer gets away with it, but in a free society it is even more of a tragedy when the reason he got away with it is the arrogance, incompetence and prejudice of the representatives of the state. Any attempt at telling this story that somehow manages to make Marcia Clark the victim is profoundly and irredeemably flawed.
As I heard about this show I was pretty much determined not to watch it; I assumed it would be a tabloid ratings grab not worthy of much time. Then I noticed it was on FX, a cable network that has brought some of the best drama to television in the last decade. That track record was enough to get me to watch it - I have now seen two episodes (is that all that have aired? I am watching it On Demand and have lost track of actual airing dates). For me, the abiding question about this production is: "Why is it so bad, when it is backed by a distributor which has had such a great track record?" If you told me it was being aired on E! or Oxygen I would understand, but FX? Can this just be a pure ratings payday for those guys?
The amount of exposition they put into the mouths of the key players is absurd, on the order of: "pardon me, I am an angry black assistant DA who is down with his people and skeptical of the LAPD, can you tell me where the bathrooms are?". As cringe-worthy is the number of call-outs to a generation or two that apparently knows and cares more about the tabloid star daughters of Rob Kardashian than his role in the story being told. But what surprises and irritates me the most so far is how much of an apology the series appears to be for Clark, Gil Garcetti and the LAPD. It may be that later episodes will flip this script, but that assumes a minimum level of quality that would keep the rational viewer around long enough to see it.
By the end of that trial I thought OJ Simpson had probably killed his ex-wife and Ron Goldman. I was also certain that the prosecutors, LAPD detectives and Crime Lab and bungled their job so badly that it would be a violation of their oath for a jury to find him guilty based on the evidence actually presented in court in that trial (as opposed to evidence discussed in the media, or presented at the later civil trial). Of course it is tragic when a probably murderer gets away with it, but in a free society it is even more of a tragedy when the reason he got away with it is the arrogance, incompetence and prejudice of the representatives of the state. Any attempt at telling this story that somehow manages to make Marcia Clark the victim is profoundly and irredeemably flawed.
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Kevin M.
Feb 14, 2016, 5:16:44 PM2/14/16
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On Sun, Feb 14, 2016 at 1:21 PM, PGage <pga...@gmail.com> wrote:
...But what surprises and irritates me the most so far is how much of an apology the series appears to be for Clark, Gil Garcetti and the LAPD.
Having read Toobin's book upon which this series is based, that was his point-of-view of the trial, that Clark and cops were the good guys. Again, not that I'd want to see a dramatic retelling of the OJ trial, but if I had to, I'd prefer it to be more along the lines of a phrase tossed about during the trial, "the police framed a guilty man, and the DA's office ran with it." I genuinely believe Fuhrman planted the glove at OJ's house, and Vanatter scattered OJ's blood all over Brentwood... I also believe they each did this independently of each other, not as a grand conspiracy but just two bad cops trying to ensure a conviction, both too stupid to know their actions would lead to a not guilty verdict. Had Hodgman not left the case due to a heart condition, I doubt he'd have included the obviously planted evidence, instead letting the very convincing circumstantial case stand on its merit... which would have resulted in a conviction. Clark and Darden saw the evidence and decided to roll the dice with it, despite its obvious flaws. They started allowing in every insane bit of "evidence," including treating barking dogs as though they were freakin' Lassie.
I can't help but draw a comparison between OJ's attorneys and the recently departed Justice Scalia. By many people, these lawyers were the epitome of scumbags, but in terms of the jobs they were given, they were the best in the business. Scalia was, to me, almost entirely lacking morality or ethics, but a lawyer's job is to effectively use the law to advocate a side, and I don't think there has been a more able advocate of conservativism in my lifetime. Likewise, OJ's lawyers had no interest in the truth -- their role was to use the law to free their client. They had no choice but to point out Fuhrman's racist past and Vanatter's improper handling of evidence; it would have been negligent of them to do otherwise. And it forced Judge Ito to include in the jury's instructions that they had the right if not the obligation to reject all evidence by the LAPD as a result of their behavior (and false testimony... something they were never disciplined for after the trial). The DA's office never needed to call Furhman, but they called everybody but the dogs themselves, their strategy being to pile it on. That was a flawed strategy... they were not the heroes Toobin tried to make them out to be. Truthfully, there were no heroes at all in the OJ trial... but that makes for a clunky dramatic narrative.
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Kevin M. (RPCV)
PGage
Feb 14, 2016, 5:31:39 PM2/14/16
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I agree with you almost completely on this - the exception being that to me OJ's defense team basically were the heroes of that story; as you point out, they did their job, and did it a hell of a lot better than the DA. Defense attorneys are supposed to be focused on getting a not guilty verdict, not on getting to "The Truth". The Truth is the job of the representatives of the State, and they failed mightily in this case. The real tragedy is that they fail in the same ways over and over, both before and after the OJ Trial, but most defendants who go to trial do not have the resources OJ did to make them pay for their mistakes.
Your point about the police framing a guilty man, and the DA's office running with it, is exactly right, and makes me think not so much of Scalia, but of the Avery case told in the Netflix "Making a Murderer" doc. I have a lot of film and tv faculty and student friends who have been bashing the doc for being one-sided; my defense has been that they are misunderstanding the main point; the issue is not "is Avery guilty?", the question is, "did the police and prosecutors behave unprofessionally and illegally to violate his right to a fair trial?" The defense lawyer in that doc says basically the same thing you have here - that police plant evidence and otherwise set up suspects all the time, and almost always do so thinking they are dealing with a guilty party who they want to make sure pays for their crime. However well intentioned, society must have a zero tolerance policy towards this kind of misconduct. It is sickening that after all the money and media hype spent on the OJ case, we still seem to have missed that basic point.
I never did read Toobin's book - for some reason I always thought he was a little more hip to the complexities of the case and the flaws in the defense.
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Kevin M.
Feb 14, 2016, 6:12:31 PM2/14/16
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On Sun, Feb 14, 2016 at 2:31 PM, PGage <pga...@gmail.com> wrote:
I never did read Toobin's book - for some reason I always thought he was a little more hip to the complexities of the case and the flaws in the defense.
For better or for worse (to me, for worse) Toobin wanted his book to function almost like a fiction novel with easy-to-identify protagonists and antagonists. As a result, he cut a lot of corners when it came to true detail in favor of a story.
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Kevin M. (RPCV)
JW
Feb 15, 2016, 5:38:14 AM2/15/16
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> It is sickening that after all the money and media
> hype spent on the OJ case, we still seem to
> have missed that basic point.
> hype spent on the OJ case, we still seem to
> have missed that basic point.
All the money (not counting the defense) and hype were about "A celebrity is on trial for murder, in a city where we especially love to cover celebrities!" The coverage was more about the Dancing Itos than it was about jurisprudence.
Kevin M.
Feb 15, 2016, 12:34:21 PM2/15/16
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On Mon, Feb 15, 2016 at 2:38 AM, JW <redb...@gmail.com> wrote:
> It is sickening that after all the money and mediaAll the money (not counting the defense) and hype were about "A celebrity is on trial for murder, in a city where we especially love to cover celebrities!" The coverage was more about the Dancing Itos than it was about jurisprudence.
> hype spent on the OJ case, we still seem to
> have missed that basic point.
While there was a massive amount of tabloid journalism connected to the trial (the channel that showed more OJ coverage than any other was the E! channel) in many ways it raised the level of journalism, if only temporarily. The good ol' National Enquirer stopped reporting on Elvis sightings and haunted vacuum cleaners to transition to covering real, living people and breaking news (they actually had several exclusives connected to the trial that involved real journalists doing real journalism). CourtTV, a channel I wish still existed, was able to get prestigious law professors to talk technically about all aspects of the criminal justice system. Several who were known for cheap theatrics and tabloid schlock managed to grow a pair of journalistic gonads to discuss major social issues related to the trial (remember when Geraldo started wearing glasses while seated behind a desk?). So yes, there was a lot of hype on the news, but critical viewers could seek out legitimate content as well.
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Kevin M. (RPCV)
PGage
Apr 6, 2016, 5:40:43 AM4/6/16
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So I did stay with the series to tonight's end, and it did improve, both in getting a little more balanced, and in terms of the quality of its story telling and acting. But it had a long way to travel from the first two episodes to get to good, and it never really got there.
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One of the very big creative problems with the project turned out to be John Travolta; While the series suffered from the same problem that Oliver Stone's film "W" had - putting more effort into impersonation of recent historical figures than telling their stories - as the series went on I thought most of the main actors did a decent job of getting inside their characters, which the glaring exception of Travolta's Shapiro. One reason the first two episodes were so bad it became apparent is that Shapiro dominated the early part of the story.
While the script does honestly portray the trial errors made by the prosecution, and allows that Johnny C and even F. Lee were more than just media caricatures, I think it still failed badly to capture the truth of the trial. It was determine to mindlessly recapitulate the narrative that a mostly Black jury was either too ignorant to understand the overwhelming scientific evidence or too emotionally triggered by its addiction to racial victimization to see past the one bad apple racist cop. The biggest flaws here were insufficient attention paid to the role of Barry Scheck (and what I think was the complete erasure of his partner Peter Neufeld) & failure to pay off the early attention to the timeline evidence.
More important than Furman and the glove that did not fit in this trial was how completely and totally Scheck and Neufeld destroyed the credibility of the LA Crime Lab; the series shows a little of this, but makes it seem like a minor aspect, rather than the dominant factor in the not guilty verdict that it was. Johnny Cochran's mantra and charisma may have made a majority of the jury want to acquit OJ, but Scheck and Neufeld provided them with the actual justification to do so. What Marcia Clark and this film never seem able to understand is that the not guilty verdict was not based on a refusal to understand or accept the DNA evidence, but a very reasonable and justified refusal to accept the reliability and validity of blood evidence handled by an incompetent crime lab. And why did the show spend time setting up a potential problem with the State's timeline theory and evidence, and then never show us that by the end of the trial it had completely blown up in their face (or did I somehow miss an episode, which is possible)? Even with the crime lab problems, even with the racist Furman testimony, even with Marcia's tone deaf Closing Statement, they might have gotten a conviction if they had presented a reasonably plausible and consistent explanation of the time line that got OJ from the drive-through to the murder scene, past the various supposed witnesses, and into the Limo as required. Or, if they simply had not given a specific time line at all, rather than one that was full of holes and self-contradictions and simply could not possibly be correct.
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Dave Sikula
Apr 7, 2016, 9:17:54 PM4/7/16
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Just a note that I couldn't disagree with your assessment of Travolta. I'm not a fan of his, per se, but was gobsmacked (in a good way) by his baroque performance. To stand out (in the best way) like that in such a high-powered cast (and, really, there were no weak links with the possible exception of Gooding) was dazzling. Vance, Paulson, Brown, and Lane were exceptional, but Travolta was right up there with them.
Dave Sikula
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PGage
Apr 7, 2016, 10:18:26 PM4/7/16
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That's interesting Dave - I will think on it some more, but while I thought the rest of the cast was good to very good (Paulson in particular, who in the past I have been unhappy with in other roles, was a stand out) I really thought was not just not good, but horrible.
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