Nicole Kidman: is she still in there? Increasingly, I wonder. In The Perfect Couple, she plays Greer Garrison Winbury, a super-wealthy bestselling novelist whose mask has begun to slip. Except it’s hard to be sure when, exactly, such slippage might be in progress. Yes, I did detect a certain disdain when she asked her future daughter-in-law, naughtily wandering about in her pyjamas, if she hadn’t been given a “family robe” to wear. And no, I don’t believe I imagined her ginger handling of an unwelcome (because naff) cellophane-wrapped fruit basket, as if it was a used Covid test or a three-pack of G-strings from Target. But I could also be wrong about both these things. At this point, there are bathroom tiles more expressive than Kidman.
To be fair, the script doesn’t give her much (any) help. “I’m just tying up a few loose ends,” Greer will coolly announce from her desk, the ends in question pertaining, we gather, to the sudden death, the previous day, of a female house guest; the ensuing cancellation of a family wedding that was due to happen that day; the opening of a police investigation; her husband’s possible infidelity; and, finally, the arrival of a team from People magazine to do an interview ahead of the publication of her new novel the next day. In the light of such frantic activity, I think we tend to share the amazement of People’s journalist at her productivity (“your 29th book!”). How does she do it? Who knows. All I can tell you is that her “Dolly and Dash” series, the result of an “Agatha Christie obsession”, is probably not published by Fitzcarraldo Editions.
The Perfect Couple is based on a novel by Elin Hilderbrand (“the queen of the beach read”, I discover), and it has a somewhat Christie-ish vibe itself. We’re on Nantucket, an island in Massachusetts, in a big house that has been in the family of Greer’s priapic husband Tag (Liev Schreiber) for generations, and which no one is allowed to leave by order of the cops. Such confinement is painful, in spite of the beach and the pool, the Adirondack chairs and the green juice that’s served at breakfast, since not only are they all sleeping with each other, but they all hate each other too.
In residence are Greer’s three very unpleasant sons, including Benji (Billy Howle, an actor I often find unconvincing, even wooden), who was about to get married to Amelia (Eve Hewson), and a fully bitchy daughter-in-law, Abby (Dakota Fanning, on excellent form). Staying in the Sand Dollar Rooms and Cottages nearby, but seemingly allowed to visit Summerlands (the big house) whenever she pleases, is Greer’s old friend Isabel, who is played by – yes, really – Isabelle Adjani.
This series is the latest in a long line of TV projects for Kidman (Big Little Lies, Nine Perfect Strangers, The Undoing, Expats), each one more hotel-room bland than the last. Her character is a variation on a theme (rich, brittle, possibly with hair extensions) whose clothes helpfully indicate her mood. A chunky Ralph Lauren-style knit suggests distress; a watery silk blouse semaphores the approach of hot, yet also cold, sex. (“I can’t help myself,” says Tag, in the same voice he might use to ask her if she fancies some clam chowder.) It’s all very odd, especially when you consider that Kidman has been directed by Lars von Trier and Park Chan-wook, and I have my own theories, possibly libellous, as to why she keeps doing it.
But in this show, I must admit, she has competition from Adjani in the weirdness stakes. If the presence of Adjani’s character is never fully explained – though when she says “bien sûr!” we do get a helpful subtitle – it’s beyond bizarre to find a winner of five Césars trapped in this fiasco, as distant from François Truffaut as Walmart is from Oscar de la Renta. While Greer says things like “I thought we were out of Tanqueray”, and notes that she “studied Tom Wolfe” before she met Tag’s family (it’s satire, sweetie, not anthropology), Isabel only gets to ponder whom she might have slept with back at the dawn of time. Did she do her bit for French-US relations with Greer’s husband? Hmm. I would guess that she did. I mean, she’s French, guys! An actual European. They shuck every oyster going.
The Perfect Couple
Netflix
[See also: Why “Sherwood” matters]
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This article appears in the 04 Sep 2024 issue of the New Statesman, Starmer under fire