PLAY WITHIN THE PLAY

CUMBERBATCH COMPOSES COMPLICATED CHARACTER FOR SERIES THRILLER

By PETER THOMAS BUSCH

When a child goes missing in New York City, the worst of the big dirty city is uncovered in the search for the missing boy.

Benedict Cumberbatch stars as Eric, oh, I mean, Vincent, the father who slipped up by not having a few extra minutes in the morning to walk his son, Edgar, to school.

This fictional account tells the true crime story of every parent’s worst nightmare.

Director Lucy Forbes gradually wends in the psychodrama for this 6 part Netflix Original thriller series by giving Vincent a doppelganger with whom he becomes more and more entangled as the plot accelerates and then reverses.

The storyline is made all the more intriguing because a parallel narrative filled with suspicions is created about the murky side of New York City night clubs and the police department. For the longest time, the narratives appear to be destined to merge into one as the search for Edgar, played by Ivan Morris Howe, intensifies with various clues as to the child’s disappearance being uncovered.

Detective Michael Ledroit has been tasked with finding the boy, but he has a few intriguing subplots to deal with simultaneously: one personal narrative involving his male lover, and two, a work narrative involving corruption among NYPD Vice.

McKinley Belcher shows Detective Ledroit as part of and apart from his fellow police, even having to deal with his superior officer interfering with the investigation. But Ledroit is invested in a personal life that keeps his day from becoming totally chaotic.

The series is not quite a puppet show of real life, but Vincent and his business partner, Lennie, have created a puppet show popular among New York City kids. Vincent’s alter ego is a new puppet inspired by Edgar’s initial ideas that Vincent had ignored before his son went missing.

Lennie is played by Dan Fogler, who also plays Francis Ford Coppola in the series, The Offer (2022), about the production of the Godfather (1972) and producer Albert S. Ruddy.

Lennie and Vincent are good friends, but even that relationship is challenged as Vincent falls into a drunken paranoid trance as the frantic search for his missing son drags on too long, with few clews.

Vincent has also fallen out of favour with his wife, Cassie, played by Gaby Hoffman. Hoffman shows the trauma of parents in similar situations, but she has already moved on from Vincent as their marriage had collapsed into senseless arguments.

Vincent and Cassie still work through the trauma together, wound tight sometimes when the police narrative intersects with the family dynamic narrative.

The thrilling story creates psychodrama in several different directions, and maybe, the next episode will reveal more, how everything fits together.

Cumberbatch musters a distinct character from his other performances, at times being calm and in control, and at other times, having totally lost it in the frantic mania of trying to find the missing son.

The character is somewhat complicated by emoting a natural dislike as the puppet master looks totally at fault for all the problems, from time to time.

Initially, uncertainty is created as to the cause of the daily marital squabbles between the unhappy couple. But the search for Edgar wares Vincent out, until Cumberbatch begins to reveal the inside weaknesses of the character, one fault at a time.