There's no shortage of lusty looks or beady–eyed avarice in Dirty Sexy Money, ABC's new satire of extraordinarily wealthy Americans, airing on Wednesday nights this fall. But despite its loaded hat trick of a title, the rub here is fatherhood.
Donald Sutherland, with his thinning pearlescent hair grown long, stars as Tripp Darling, the patriarch in a power suit you definitely want to see tumble. Not one of Tripp's five spawn has done him proud, though they are distinctly in his own image—from the quasi–famous starlet who only gets roles because daddy buys them to the perpetual hanger–on playboy who has Ethan Hawke on speed dial and a cocaine dealer teaching him origami, and who delivers some of the most absurdist lines of the first episode, like "I can't even win a yacht without getting arrested." Two other sons—one's a priest and the other a politician—are hiding the all–too–human evidence of their transgressions. This is indeed a drama for the heirhead age.
Peter Krause of Six Feet Under fame grounds the family circus as Nick George, an altruistic young attorney who gets tapped to be the Darlings' consigliere after his own father's untimely demise. Nick reluctantly accepts the job—if only to dole out the sizable charity donation that comes with it—and soon his cell phone starts clanging like a classic rock station, with different ditties for each wayward Darling. One needs bail money, another needs a prenup consult, and then there's the love child who can't get into preschool. Nick's own wife and daughter begin to feel as neglected as he did as a boy, and the tug–of–war between money and morals begins anew.
The American playwright and TV writer Craig Wright—another Six Feet Under vet—conceived the series, whose first episode trots out more than one surprise. Not least of all, there's a cameo by heavily powdered and heavy–handed HDNet anchor Dan Rather, who asks rather woodenly, "Do me the honor of letting me be the first to find out whether you're running for the Senate or not."
Krause, however, commands the screen at all times. Manly protagonists have often reluctantly turned into their pops, or suffered for paternal sins, in tales from Turgenev to The Great Santini to The Corrections. Here, Nick is another doomed product of nature and nurture. In swearing not to repeat the mistakes of his paterfamilias, he inevitably succumbs to them. Luckily, the good qualities seem to have taken root right along with the bad.
