LUST FOR LIFE
Couple’s open marriage creates issues in Netflix series
Can love survive an open marriage?
That’s the question at the heart of “Wanderlust,” an hourlong dramedy starring the sublime Toni Collette (“Hereditary,” “The United States of Tara”) as a therapist who rethinks her life after a neardeath experience.
Flashbacks capture Joy Richards (Collette) on her bike, enjoying a leisurely ride, when she is struck by a car and tossed to the ground. (As someone who was hit by a car four years ago, I can attest to the visceral authenticity of these scenes.)
Almost healed, Joy tries to resume her sex life with her husband, Alan (Steven Mackintosh), a university professor. There’s just one problem and it takes them both a lot of grappling, physically and emotionally, to acknowledge that after more than 20 years and three children, they are bored sexually with each other.
“How do we come back from this?” Alan wonders.
Alan, meanwhile, is becoming close to a younger, brittle colleague named Claire (Zawe Ashton). Joy meets a cute guy named Marvin (William Ash) in her water physiotherapy sessions.
Both Joy and Alan are surprised by how much they enjoy their extracurricular activities. They don’t want to lie to each other. They also can’t imagine giving each other up.
They decide to explain to their partners that they just want casual sex with no emotional attachments.
“It’s greed. That’s all this is,” Marvin declares. It’s a refreshing moment in a show stuffed with predictable scenes.
The Richards’ kids are almost as equally obsessed with sex.
Their youngest, Tom (Joe Hurst, “The Terror”), wants to get with the new girl in his school and is almost criminally oblivious that his best friend, the girl he turns to for support, is practically dizzy in love with him.
Middle child Naomi (Emma D’Arcy) feels battlescarred after breaking up with her girlfriend.
Eldest daughter Laura (Celeste Dring) accidentally wanders into a relationship with Jason (Royce Pier- reson), a troubled client of her mother’s.
Collette, as always, elevates the material, but there’s no escaping the sad realization that these are profoundly selfish people who deserve each other.
“Wanderlust” is a show that would be markedly improved by cutting each episode by half. There’s entirely too much thrusting and groaning, yes, we get the point, and a lot of people have sex with their clothes on. Is that a British thing? Discuss.
Sex outside marriage invites problems. Who’d have guessed that? Anyone. Everyone. “Wanderlust” just might get you searching for anything else in your Netflix queue.