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‘This one’s different,” a son says to his mother when she teases him about his latest girlfriend. Clever, he says. Stunning, ambitious, funny – “you remind me of her”. Something flickers across Mummy’s face. “She reminds you of me?” she says, and it is not really a question.
Welcome, friends, to The Girlfriend, an adaptation of the excellent psychological thriller by Michelle Frances, and an answer to the question many of us have surely pondered – just how much of an incest vibe can one get away with instilling in a shiny prestige miniseries, and can anyone get Robin Wright to star and make the whole thing disturbingly credible?
The answer to the first half is, “Yikes, quite a lot, starting with a reunion in the family home’s basement pool and catchup chat in the sauna”. The answer to the second is, “Yes you can, and how had we all forgotten how good she is when she spent five years as Claire Underwood in House of Cards? God, who’d be an actor when ungrateful viewers’ memories are so short?”
This time she is Laura, a fabulously wealthy gallery owner whose son, Daniel, is the centre of her emotional life. Laurie Davidson, who plays him, conveys abundant charm and intelligence that prevents the character from being sappy or stupid, which would immediately sink the multivalent narrative. But would Daniel still be so important if her husband, Howard (Waleed Zuaiter) were not having a long-term affair and if she hadn’t lost a baby daughter years before? Perhaps not. But perhaps yes. The Girlfriend is a brilliantly slippery beast – it employs Rashomon-style flips between Laura’s and the eponymous girlfriend’s perspectives – and likes to keep its options open.
Into this affluent family with its … interesting dynamic comes Cherry (Olivia Cooke, whose delicately ambiguous performance makes the whole thing sing). Cherry is an estate agent whom Daniel meets when shopping for the million-pound flat Ma and Pa want to buy him as he starts his medical training. She is not quite what she seems but – initially, at least – forgivably so. It’s normal to keep your background quiet if you’re young and seeking to better yourself, isn’t it? To give it a bit of a polish in front of your new boyfriend’s parents? Especially if you’ve already heard his mother laughing about your vulgar name with her best friend. And, if she’s going to be so snobbish, why wouldn’t you give in to the temptation to ramp up the public displays of affection in front of her and put a spoke in the wheels of her plans for Daniel’s birthday? Also, if your boss promotes a useless posh colleague over you because of her family connections, wouldn’t you gob in his flask of coffee? Oh. No?
Getting the audience to draw lines then have to rub them out when another revelation or interpretation of events is provided is The Girlfriend’s modus operandi. Figures from Cherry’s past appear and, perhaps, suggest that coffee-spit is indeed the sign of a ruthlessly vengeful mind. Or, perhaps Laura finds only what she wants to find. Soon, the paper is fuzzy and every new line you try to draw automatically blurs.
The relationship between Laura and Cherry is at first cat and mouse, then an arms race and then – after a pivotal decision – all-out war.
The action becomes more extreme and occasionally ludicrous, (such as when a wedding cake apparently packed with exploding offal ruins the nuptials of Cherry’s ex). But, as the six episodes go on, The Girlfriend has plenty of touches that stop full preposterousness from reigning. When, for example, Cherry buys a dress from a boutique she can’t afford, the salesperson warns her there are no returns if it’s been worn. It is as much an act of kindness as a warning, but, either way, it’s a reminder to us and Cherry that the distinctions between Us/Her and Them are ineffable but still infuriatingly detectable.
Class distinctions, the power of money, the different kinds of love we are capable of, how liberal parents should be, how emotions can warp under pressure, how desperate we can become to be believed, and how we distinguish between ambition and greed, need and desire. All this is at play in The Girlfriend, which has lost little of the book’s psychological acuity and retained all of the suspense. Not one to watch with your sons, perhaps, but otherwise – enjoy.
