6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
‘The Rainmaker' Review: In John Grisham's Court on USA
The implied contract between an audience and a John Grisham story contains legal-drama boilerplate regarding what the client can reasonably expect: idealistic lawyers, disillusioned lawyers, unlikely breaches of the criminal code, wholesale violations of logic and, in the end, a thoroughly stirring summation. All of which is true of USA's 'The Rainmaker,' except for that last part, maybe: Only half the 10-part series, a virtual trickle, was made available for review. So whether this 'Rainmaker' follows the path of the 1997 film version—one of the less successful Grisham adaptations—remains to be seen. This viewer, it should be mentioned, was looking forward to episode 6.
If Milo Callaghan strikes a familiar note it might be due to his vague resemblance to Matt Damon, who played Mr. Grisham's jurisprudential wunderkind Rudy Baylor in the Francis Ford Coppola adaptation of nearly 30 years ago. Both actors have a gift for mixing naivete, guile and determination, and the character of Rudy relies on all three: Just out of law school, yet to pass the bar, he gets into a boardroom debate with his new employer, Leo F. Drummond (a terrific John Slattery), on what is supposed to be his first day at the big Charleston, S.C., firm. He is promptly fired, because he can't back down. (Of course not; he'll have to eventually face Goliath.)
