If Arrested Development was turned into a drama series, it would have to be Dirty Sexy Money.Starring Peter Krause, Donald Sutherland and William Baldwin, Dirty Sexy Money plays out like that defunct comedy series, spiced with a bit of Falcon Crest or Knots Landing (children born in or after the 80's, ask your parents). DSM centers on the Darling family --- New York billionaires --- and a self-made lawyer named Nick George (Peter Krause).
As a young boy, Nick lost his father to the Darlings because his dad was always fixing every little mess the Darlings and their spoiled children get into, as their family lawyer. When Nick grew up to become a fine lawyer himself, his relationship with his father is strained and he's always very careful never to have anything to do with him.
Until his father met his untimely fate....
Now, forced to face the Darlings again, Nick is offered by the Darling patriarch (Donald Sutherland) his father's old job and a salary of $10M yearly. And there starts the life that Nick told himself he never wants to have in the first place. The minute he gets that first call from the Darlings to bail one of them out ---- his life, as he knows it, is soon over.
The strength of this show lies in Peter Krause. What he brings to DSM isn't just his numerous Emmy awards, but his penchant for playing a character with too many sides to him. His character, Nick, is a do-gooder alright (booooring), but Krause lets the viewers see there's something else to him, something more.
The pilot episode appears to be fast-paced but in this case, it's not always a good thing. Stories as big as the Darling families themselves should take time to develop. By the end of the hour, I was exhausted from watching what went on, much like Nick who was also exhausted from becoming the fixer-upper to each of the Darlings' mess (and all five or six of them had one each, in one episode alone!).
They fed the viewers too much in one sitting that 1) I didn't want to abandon it the next time it airs (because I so want to make chismax! *gossip*) and 2) I actually think I'd need a second, a third and maybe a fourth episode to truly appreciate Dirty Sexy Money.
Hmmmm.... now that I have time to think about it, that's a clever ploy to try and keep a viewer interested.
Dirty Sexy Money is on ABC TV, Wednesdays at 10 PM. It had a season premiere last Sept. 26.
[Dirty Sexy Money]
