In ‘Spoils,’ TV epics bear burden of spoof
THE GOOD parts of “Spoils of Babylon” are funny enough that you almost feel churlish saying the jokes stretch a couple of absurdities too far.
A sendup of overstuffed TV epics, “Spoils” runs six parts and probably would have been funnier in three. But a good cast and a sharp eye for the excesses of the past ensure that some moments of interest always lie ahead.
The writers for “Spoils” clearly love the sprawling melodramas that clomped across the TV landscape a few years back, from “Dallas” to “The Winds of War” or “Rich Man, Poor Man.”
Actually, that golden age is more than a few years ago, meaning the audience that most appreciates “Spoils” may be more, uh, middle-age.
Will Ferrell plays Eric Jonrosh, the nominal “author” and narrator. He looks like Walter White and speaks in distracted mock-serious monologues while juggling glasses of wine.
Tobey Maguire carries the action, and very nicely, as Devon Morehouse. Devon was wandering along a Texas road in 1931 when he was picked up by an oil prospector named Jonas Morehouse (Tim Robbins).
Just as Jonas’ world was collapsing, his first gusher came in, triggering the Morehouse rise to unimaginable fortune that, naturally, came at great human cost.
This included Devon’s relationship with Jonas’ biological daughter Cynthia (Kristen Wiig), who plays a key role despite at times flashing a lower IQ than one of the oil barrels.
Over six episodes, almost no cliche of TV epics is left unlampooned. In the end, ironically, “Spoils of Babylon” creates some excess of its own.