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 idnapped is a new NBC series about a rich kid who gets abducted and the many good-looking adults who attempt to find him. It is an utterly shameless piece of fright theater, one of those dramas that whip the viewer into an adrenalized froth by presenting at least three unexpected plot twists per commercial break. I found the show totally enthralling, while also hating myself for finding the show totally enthralling.
Foremost among the good-looking adults is Knapp (Jeremy Sisto). It’s unclear to me whether Knapp is a first name or a last name, and I’m not holding out for an answer. Yes, folks, Knapp is the silent type — a badass expert at kidnap retrieval with a mysterious past and the fashion sense of a grunge roadie. He comes with a British sidekick, Turner (Carmen Ejogo), who is better looking than Helen of Troy. We can only hope that as the season progresses she will be called upon to perform many scenes in her underwear. Holding down the low end is Latimer King (Delroy Lindo), an FBI agent lured out of retirement by an irresistible case of Find the White Boy.
The white boy in question is Leopold Cain, spawn of the very rich and beautiful Conrad and Ellie Cain (Timothy Hutton and Dana Delany). Conrad is a financier with dreamy blue eyes and a troubled past. Ellie is a lonely Manhattan power wife with fabulous hair and, apparently, a paramour on the side. There’s a precocious little brat in the mix too, and a slutty older daughter who attends Brown but spends most of her time trolling the local bars for manmeat. (Note to self: I knew I should have applied to Brown.)
After viewing two episodes, I can’t say that I like any of the Cains very much, or that I’m especially worried about Leopold’s safe return. But that’s never the point in these cat-and-mouse affairs. The point is the rush of events, the grim ratcheting of suspense and the incremental revelation of various dank secrets. Sisto is an odd choice for a lead; when last spotted, he was attempting to carve a tattoo into his sister’s back as Billy, the resident psychopath on Six Feet Under. He doesn’t look very menacing in his baggy jackets and jeans. But he does imbue the role with a certain sullen cool.
"You’re not very good with people, are you, Mr. Knapp?" Ellie asks him at their initial interview.
"No," he says quietly, "but I’m good at finding them."
There’s also something quite gratifying for us wimpy slobs in watching another wimpy slob glide through the world with such assurance, beating down bouncers and staying a half-step ahead of the feds.
As it turns out, Knapp and Latimer King are old buds. Years ago, Knapp was the big guy’s protégé, a star rookie with the Bureau. But then something tragic happened, and they’ve been splitsville ever since. The Cain case serves as their reunion, a chance to rekindle that unacknowledged homoerotic interracial tension that animates so much of American culture.
And let’s just get this out into the open: Lindo — bald and beautiful as ever — lights up the screen. I was deeply in lust with him by the end of the pilot and hoping for a shower scene in the second show. But Kidnapped favors violence — that most patriotic of come-ons — over sex. We get good looks at half a dozen corpses in the first twenty minutes of action. (For perspective, that’s more than we’ve seen during the entire Iraq War!) Fortunately, the characters utter no naughty words, so the program cannot be accused of corrupting the decency of our children.
My hunch is that Kidnapped will become a big fat hit. It’s slyly appropriates the attributes of other hit shows: the condensed time frame of 24 (each episode covers about a day), the tangled backstories of Lost and the loving reconstruction of murders that fuels half the dramas in prime time. Knapp makes for an offbeat hero, a canny blend of Columbo and David Carradine in Kung Fu. The bad guys are all sufficiently diabolical. The dialogue and editing are for the most part crisp. The cinematography has that comforting gloss of TV cleanliness. Most important, the show seems to capture the prevailing national spirit of entitlement and paranoia. The tagline — "suspect everything" — says it all.
This mood is best captured in a scene between Knapp and Ellie, which takes place on the rooftop of the Cain penthouse. From this rampart, Ellie has a stunning view of the city below. "Business as usual out there," she says philosophically. "The ebb and flow of the tides, Mr. Knapp. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Traffic jams. Baseball games. A teenager’s first kiss. I don’t understand how it all hasn’t come to a halt, how the world can keep spinning on its axis and not miss one silly revolution for my boy."
"The men who took Leopold are motivated by greed," Knapp responds, in what counts for him as a tender moment. "Your son’s only worth something to them alive, Mrs. Cain."
Delany and Sisto do their best here, but it’s hard not to feel annoyed at this mauling of the heartstrings. I found myself wishing Knapp would summon the courage to deliver a more honest response, something like: I’ll do my best to get your son back. But wake up and smell the profit motive, Mrs. Cain. Your husband is a cutthroat businessman. That’s what made your son a target.
In fact, the Cains’ reaction to the kidnapping exudes the sort of melodramatic self-regard that has marked our culture since 9/11. They view the tragedy as wholly unrelated to their own lifestyle, a horror perpetrated by hidden assailants. To capture these goons and restore the proper world order requires only a bumbling hero who bends the rules with the utmost discretion. Sound familiar?
The saddest thing about Kidnapped is that its scary premise (a child being snatched) is already a reality in many parts of the world. It’s one of the prices paid by the upper classes for enjoying astounding wealth amid the starving. Given our own looming economic crises — massive domestic and foreign debt, the waning of the cheap-oil era — Americans could be one economic collapse away from needing our own retrieval specialists.
That may sound alarmist, but you know what Knapp would say: Business as usual out there, Mrs. Cain. Business as usual. n°
| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Steve Almond‘s new essay collection is (Not that You Asked). It is, like much of his work, filthy.
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©2006 Steve Almond and hooksexup.com.
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