Alastair McKay From New York to LA we go with Noah and co, and the shrinks work overtime
emotional battle, returns to the scene of the original crime).
So to LA. Noah is teaching. He is not happy about this. Indeed, followers of Noah’s swollen ego will recognise the volcanic rage which lurks beneath his futile attempts to explore the subtexts of Animal Farm. “Beginning Wednesday,” says Noah, “get ready for The Wasteland.” Helen, meanwhile, has a dream life and a house with a view. You’d think she would be happy but no. Helen keeps experiencing imaginary earthquakes, is in therapy and it is not going well. Why? Well, partly because her therapist is catching around trying to understand her trauma, and she is in denial about being in denial.
“What trauma?” she asks the shrink. “Your husband left you abruptly after 25 years of marriage,” he replies, “hit his new wife’s brother-in-law with a car, fled the scene and ended up going to prison for three years. Meanwhile, your older son failed out of two high schools, barely graduated and your daughter dropped out of college, flew off to Paris, with a man twice her age, who abused her.” “I mean, well,” says Helen, “when you put it like that …”
There’s other stuff, none of it relaxing. Dr Vic’s overbearing mother is in the house, filling the fridge, because her boy needs feeding up (he does look a bit peaky). Helen’s son Trevor is maybegay. And there’s a space cadet neighbour girl who is attractive enough to cause plot havoc, and she is suggesting goat yoga. Deep in divorceland, everything is beautifully poised. What could possibly go right?