Imagine a 1995 novel about a scrappy young lawyer whose clients are suing a health insurance company that refused to pay for a life-saving treatment, resulting in their son’s death. Now imagine that novel is adapted into a TV series that decides to eliminate the health insurance angle altogether.
Weird decision, all things considered! Even taking into account that the show was put in motion before anyone even knew the name Luigi Mangione. The topic is (unfortunately) as evergreen as it gets, and yet conspicuously absent here.
Welcome to USA Network’s “The Rainmaker,” based on the John Grisham book, and which shoulda been a movie. Which it already was. In 1997. From writer-director Francis Ford Coppola and starring Matt Damon.
If you squint, you might remember when USA was known for its “blue skies” shows, which were light, upbeat, original series ideal for passing the time while folding laundry. I never understood why the cable channel abandoned the genre, or original programming, for that matter. But now it’s dipping its toe back in.
“The Rainmaker’s” basic framework actually lends itself to a TV series, of a guy fresh out of law school and desperate for a job who ends up working for an ambulance chaser named Bruiser. His new employer may be dodgy, but he also has a stronger moral compass than those pricier, snootier attorneys across town with their corporate clients and Brioni suits. In the book and the film, the kid takes the case of the aforementioned couple and it is a classic David vs. Goliath setup, with Grisham’s signature propulsive energy.
TV needs shows right now about defense attorneys fighting for the underdog, and while there are a couple currently built around this premise (the Kathy Bates-led “Matlock” on CBS and “The Lincoln Lawyer” on Netflix), that’s still an anemic number. So on one hand, I welcome the 10-episode “Rainmaker” with open arms.
On the other hand, it’s not very good. Too bad, because it initially captures the right Grisham-esque tone.
Milo Callaghan steps into the role originated by Matt Damon, and his looks do vaguely suggest a freshly scrubbed Damon in his earlier roles. Even so, Callaghan lacks the necessary charisma that could elevate him from yet another generic white guy on screen. Rudy is meant to be the straight man, while everyone around him gets to be more colorful, but his earnest, grounding presence shouldn’t be this nondescript, either.
In this version, Bruiser is a woman (Lana Parrilla) and she is savvy, seasoned and jaded, working out a building that was once a taco joint. It’s a nice visual joke every time the show spends time in her offices. Her paralegal is Deck (P.J. Byrne in the Danny DeVito role), who is just as jaded as Bruiser. Though initially impatient with Rudy’s naivete, Deck eventually comes around to mentoring the new lawyer.
The central case is similar-ish: A mother wants to sue a hospital after her son dies. She says he was admitted with the flu; the hospital says his death was the result of drug overdose. But mom insists he’d been clean for a year, there’s no way this was an overdose. Rudy believes her and takes the case. Why does the show remove the story’s excoriating plot about the specific venal-ness of the health insurance industry? A dogged lawyer up against this type of defendant is such a key element to the original and this pointless softening the edges is meant to appease who exactly? Media executives? Corporate sponsors? Certainly not viewers.
The pilot episode is promising enough, only for subsequent episodes to devolve from there. Fundamentally, there isn’t enough story. So we’re stuck spending time with opposing counsel (John Slattery, doing a version of the overly confident man he’s played many times before; no role has tapped his talents the way “Mad Men” did) as well as Rudy’s girlfriend, who also happens to work for opposing counsel and is being pressured to provide oppo research on Rudy’s weaknesses. None of this is halfway interesting, and when the show cuts away from the central trio of Rudy, Bruiser and Deck, the series loses whatever snap it has, largely because the other characters are bland and undeveloped.
Even Rudy is dull. That’s a matter of the writing but also the casting. It takes more than a cornfed visage to carry a show.
“The Rainmaker” — 2 stars (out of 4)
Where to watch: 9 p.m. Fridays on the USA Network (and streaming on Peacock)
Nina Metz is a Tribune critic.