We’ve been in the middle of this current crazy real estate market, both on the buying and selling side, and it’s pretty insane. What we don’t tend to know about, though, is what’s actually going on in the lives of the people who own the house we’re bidding on or with the people bidding on what we’re selling. A new series by Liz Feldman examines both, in the same twisty way she examined grief in her previous series, Dead To Me.
Opening Shot: As Ozzy Osbourne’s “Mama, I’m Coming Home” plays, we see scenes of the Los Feliz neighborhood in Los Angeles. Then we push in on a house that’s on the market; people are walking through an open house.
The Gist: During the open house, Lydia and Paul Morgan (Lisa Kudrow, Ray Romano) have locked themselves in their son’s bedroom, watching the looky-loos walk through on a security camera. Paul, a contractor, has painstakingly restored their 1920s Spanish-style villa in order to maximize its market value — the house where he grew up and where he and Lydia raised their two kids — but they both want the new place to have an owner that will take care of it.
Leslie Fisher (Abbi Jacobson) and Sarah Weber (Poppy Liu) are a couple who have passed this house on their walks for years. Now that they’ve stopped IVF, Leslie feels they have enough saved up for this place, but Sarah keeps finding fault with it: It’s too dark, the neighborhood could be iffy (it’s not), etc. As we see later on, Sarah isn’t completely done trying for a baby yet.
Carla Owens (Teyonah Parris) and Dennis Sampson (O-T Fagbenle) walk through with Dennis’ mother Denise (Anna Maria Horsford). Carla is very pregnant and the two of them love the space, but Carla just doesn’t think they’ll be able to swing it. Dennis, on the other hand, thinks it’s possible if his mother contributes after selling her Brooklyn home and moves in with them.
JD Campbell (Luke Wilson) is a former soap actor who has been “between projects” for awhile, and is looking to downsize from the modern monstrosity he bought with his wife. Margo Starling (Linda Cardellini) is a neighbor that Lydia hates, but seems to be very curious about the house. She goes on and on about the place with her girlfriend Gwen (Kate Moennig), but as we see later, she’s also married to someone else.
Lydia and Paul also have their own secrets. Lydia, a concert pianist, has stopped playing due to an undisclosed condition that causes uncontrollable tremors. Paul finds out that Mikey (Denis Leary), a man from their past, is out of prison; he comes by and extorts $80,000 from Paul, who doesn’t have the money. The couple have been empty-nesters for awhile, but the reason why they aren’t in communication with their kids is more tragic than anything else.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? No Good Deed has the serious-but-funny tone of creator Liz Feldman’s previous series Dead To Me.
Our Take: The idea behind No Good Deed is that the people who will be bidding on this fantastic house all think of it as a dream house in a way, one that might fix issues they’re having in their lives. But what they don’t know is the secrets that house has, going all the way back to at least Paul’s childhood.
Essentially, we’re dealing with four families: Lydia and Paul, along with the three others bidding on the house (yes, three… that will become apparent by the end of the episode). What struck us during the first episode, though, is that while Lydia and Paul are both dealing with some real darkness in their lives, holding secrets that may actually tear their lives apart if they’re revealed, the other families seem to have some pretty common ones in the dramedy world.
One couple has in-law issues. Another will have to deal with infidelity. A third isn’t on the same page about family planning. Those three feel more like the subjects of a Lifetime movie — maybe even a Hallmark movie — than a dark comedy that’s more dramatic than funny.
What’s going to keep us watching is Lydia and Paul’s story, and not just because we love watching Romano and Kudrow share scenes together. Their story has the most potential to go in a number of directions, and there’s more than enough mystery around that story — What does Mikey know? What happened with their kids? — to keep us intrigued. But every time we go away from Lydia and Paul to the other stories, we get anxious to come back to them. We’re wondering if the rest of the season will have the same issues, where it needs to spend time on less interesting stories at the sacrifice of the one that actually has dramatic potential.
Sex and Skin: Margo is seen in bed with Gwen, but that’s about it.
Parting Shot: As Leslie escapes the front yard of the Morgans’ house — more on that in a bit — we pan away from the front of the house late at night.
Sleeper Star: When you cast Denis Leary in a part, you know that he can be menacing when he needs to be, but he can also be bitingly funny. We saw the former in the first episode, but not the latter, and we hope to see more of the latter.
Most Pilot-y Line: Why would Leslie even try to look around the house late at night to begin with? That feels like a plot device instead of something that could actually happen.
Our Call: STREAM IT. What we’re hoping is that the one good story out of the four in No Good Deed can carry the series’ first season, at least until the others improve. The show’s excellent ensemble deserves that kind of patience.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.