How Big Little Lies went from A-list melodrama to courtroom cliches
In 2017, HBO adapted Liane Moriarty’s Sydney-set novel of suburban revenge Big Little Lies for the small screen, moving the action to northern California. The show won awards, critical acclaim and legions of fans after introducing viewers to the “Monterey Five”, a disparate group of women tied together by a chilling secret that unravelled over the course of seven captivating episodes. As the programme switched between present-day police interrogations and the past, it charted the rising tensions between the main characters and dropped clues about what happened on the fateful night of the local school’s Audrey Hepburn and Elvis Presley-themed trivia night fundraiser.
It was wine-drenched melodrama rather than high art, but it underscored several issues that affect women, from the private brutality of domestic violence to the false dichotomy between working mothers and their stay-athome counterparts. All of this was elevated by enviable interiors and exuberant A-list performances, most notably Reese Witherspoon’s highly strung housewife Madeline and Laura Dern as
Renata, helicopter parent to the confusingly named Amabella-with-an-M (“It’s French”). Plus, it delivered more quotable lines of dialogue in an hour than most dramas manage in a year. (“It’s one thing should he kill you, but God forbid you miss a party.”)
In the final moments of season one, the shocking truth was revealed: Madeline’s ex-husband’s new wife Bonnie (Zoë Kravitz) had pushed local sociopath Perry down a flight of steps after he lunged at his wife Celeste (Nicole Kidman) one last time. With the four women who witnessed it keeping mum, however, the police had no evidence, and with every other loose end wrapped up, there was neither the need nor the source material for a second season. In 2019, we got one anyway, this time with the addition of Meryl Streep in ill-fitting false teeth.
Playing Perry’s mother Mary Louise, she didn’t believe her son had slipped to his death and so tried and failed to sue Celeste for custody of her and Perry’s bratty twins, causing Big Little Lies to devolve into a series of desk-pounding, gavel-banging courtroom cliches that seemed designed purely to fill time. Other scenes appeared to have been written to be made into memes, such as Renata finding out her husband had been arrested for securities fraud and hissing: “I will not NOT be rich.” While giving more screen time to Bonnie redressed the fact that she had been sidelined for most of season one, adding her abusive and allegedly psychic mother Elizabeth (Crystal Fox) to the mix painted the only characters of colour as violent eccentrics.
It finally ended, albeit where a more entertaining show would have begun. We saw the Monterey Five walking into the police station after Bonnie insisted they come clean. Would she confess? Would the others back her up? Could she go to jail for the rest of her life? We will never know because, according to HBO, the cast don’t have time to film a third instalment. If only they had filled their schedules sooner.