YOUR HONOR
BRYAN CRANSTON JUGGLES MORALITY AND FAMILY IN LEGAL THRILLER YOUR HONOR…
Bryan Cranston gives us the whole truth about his new legal drama.
Eight years after wrapping Walter White’s arc in Breaking Bad, Bryan Cranston is back on small-screen leading-man duties in Peter Moffat’s (Criminal Justice, Silk) thriller series Your Honor. The 10-parter pivots on a critical morality test for Cranston’s Michael Desiato, an honourable New Orleans judge and widowed father who makes some very bad choices to protect his son Adam (Hunter Doohan)…
How much did you relate to Michael’s fatherly dilemma?
BRYAN CRANSTON [Michael Desiato]:
I had never worried in my life until I became a father. And then I started thinking about safety. Those first few times when your child goes off to school and you can’t protect them… there’s a saying that goes, “Once you become a parent, you wear your heart on the outside.” And it does feel that vulnerable. The premise of Your Honor captures that level of anxiety that every parent feels: “How do I keep my child safe?”
PETER MOFFAT [Creator/writer]:
Like Bryan, I like to think that I knew what my moral standards were. But the process of writing this show over the past few years has made me think much harder, and better, and become less sure about what my moral standards are. It’s always true that more than one thing can be true of one character at the same time, and sometimes they are in opposition. It’s possible for Michael to be a really decent human being and at the same time, to be deeply morally conflicted. It just makes the drama more interesting.
Like Walter White, Michael’s efforts to protect his family go downhill…
BC: Generally, I’m really attracted to characters who are complex and flawed, as Walter White was. And Michael finds himself having to accept that is part of who he is. The difference is that the decision-making was more of a protracted idea in Walter White’s case. In this one, it’s instantaneous. He’s forced to make a decision immediately, and it has repercussions he can’t see. And the important element is that the intention of the father and son was to
turn themselves in and be responsible, but there’s a turn of events that changes everything. And that’s when things starts to spin out of control.
Are we meant to retain sympathy for Michael as his lies get increasingly complex?
PM: Yes. One of the things I love about the show is that you back Michael to win here. He has all the tools, skills and experience to be successful in doing this. I think you support him because he’s always trying to be a good person despite having to lie all the time. He’s always after a sustaining self, which is good. It’s an awful long way to fall for this man.
How does the father/son relationship evolve across the series?
PM: Adam is 17 years old, on the cusp between childhood and adulthood. It’s damn hard for a 17-year-old to do what his father is asking him to do, which is to lie and keep a secret and arguably do criminal acts to protect himself. Dad can only do so much. They need to be allied in their resolve to keep him safe. But Dad is asking him to all of the things that all parents think are exactly wrong in how to be in the world. And that takes them to the interesting question which is: Is the truth always right? It feels like the answer to that is obvious, but sometimes it isn’t.
Your Honor doesn’t shy away from US race relations, and, more specifically, corruption in New Orleans.
BC: We’re reflecting societal issues. Justice isn’t blind; it sees where it wants to go. Certainly, if a rich person is involved in the same crime as a poor person, you’re going to have a different result more often than not. And that applies to race as well. Without hitting you over the head, Peter brought that issue to the surface and showed it in an honest way. It’s not to say we have an answer to that problem, but to not show the truth of it would not be doing his job. I think it’s appropriate to see. Hopefully, people will wake up to these realities, and maybe there is some social change on the horizon. Tara Bennett
‘WHAT I LOVE ABOUT THE SHOW IS THAT YOU BACK MICHAEL TO WIN’
PETER MOFFAT