Fighting words
Diane Lockhart goes from boss to basic in The Good Wife’s spin-off The Good Fight.
The Good Fight Season 1 Mondays (from 29 May) M-Net (*101) 20:30
Fans’ ears were practically ringing when Diane Lockhart (Christine Baranski) slapped her ex-friend and law partner Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) in the series finale of The Good Wife (2009-2016) for exposing Diane’s husband Kurt’s (Gary Cole) infidelity in court. A year has passed since that slap and Diane’s life is about to get even more dramatic as she becomes the centre of spin-off show The Good Fight (2017- current).
DIANE IN THE DUMPS
After a series of startling events in the first episode – including Donald Trump’s inauguration as the US President (a scene that had to be re-shot as the show’s writers assumed that Hilary Clinton would win the election) – a shaken Diane is forced out of early retirement thanks to a financial scandal that costs her her reputation and her life’s savings. “She goes through a spectacular fall. For seven years, she was behind that majestic desk in Chicago, wearing her beautiful suits and being number one at the law firm. She starts the pilot as number one, but by halfway into the episode her foundations are rocked to the core,” explains Christine.
DOWN BUT NOT OUT
There is one silver lining to Diane’s poorly predicament though – she’s still safely in the hands of The Good Wife’s executive producers, wife and husband Michelle and Robert King. “I loved the character, loved working with them as writers,” says Christine. And like Alicia did when she was in disgrace, Diane makes the smart move by going “all in” with shrewd lawyer Lucca Quinn (Cush Jumbo)… as a junior partner at the Reddick, Boseman & Kolstad law firm, which is run by mostly black legal experts and led by big boss Adrian Boseman (Delroy Lindo). It promises to add a complex layering to Diane’s struggle to go from being in charge to being the junior. “I think the show is about the racism of liberals,” hints Robert. “It felt like an interesting way to address the politics of a law firm.”