The first three episodes of
Reese Witherspoon-backed TV series “Little
Fires Everywhere” was made available Wednesday on Hulu. The television
series delivers a lot of binge appeal, and new installments will follow every
week throughout its eight-episode run.
A
Welcome Escape from Boredom amid the Pandemic
Witherspoon shares the stage
with Kerry Washington, fellow executive producer in the 1990s-set drama which
is based on the Celeste Ng’s novel. Both stars practically jumped on the phone
last week as the coronavirus pandemic spread like wildfire in Los Angeles.
“I’m not listening to too much opinion but for most scientific facts,” Witherspoon says. “I feel I’m flooded by opinion.”
This week, however, the duo
offers something that the entire nation needs, and that is A-list recreation.
Dueling
Mothers in “Little Fires Everywhere”
In the TV series, Witherspoon
plays Elena Richardson, a Type A taskmaster who operates a tight ship in her
home, suburban Shaker Heights along with her four children.
Then she encounters a nomadic
artist named Mia Warren who arrives in town with Pearl (Lexi Underwood), her
teenage daughter. A beat-up automobile contains all their belongings.
Elena, who feels something
close to white guilt, decides to rent a single mother and daughter a spare
family apartment. And that is when a chain of dramatic chain of events sets
off.
It begins by Pearl
befriending Elena’s favored children which alarms Mia. Mia ends up taking a job
as a “house manager” in Elena’s home in order to keep a close eye on her
teenage daughter.
And soon enough, issues
around class and race crop up and eventually become inflamed.
Of course, both mothers have
highly entrenched ideas of what they think or believe is the right way to be a
mother or to mother, as the case may be. Witherspoon says, “My character is
impervious to other people’s worldviews. And that is incredibly fun to play.”
Washington’s
First Reaction When She Read Ng’s Novel
When Kerry Washington first
read the best-selling novel by Celeste Ng, she surmised that Mia was somewhat
‘cold’ at first. Washington says, “You think Mia is just this narcissistic
artist who always puts her art right before every other thin. To read the
secret that serves as the driving force for that particular approach to life
was so beautifully crafted.”
The
Contribution of Liz Tigelaar
Liz Tigelaar is also an
executive producer who says Celeste Ng lent a “Shaker Heights pass” to all the
scripts, though a few elements were changed. For instance, Mia is now a black
woman, while Elena’s back story has been duly fleshed out.
And the teenagers’ lives have
been fully realized, including that of Izzy Elena’s angsty or emotional
daughter.
Mia was transformed into a
woman who finds it pretty difficult to apologize when the people around her
make her feel awkward. “We talked about trying to get rid of the ‘could
Is?’ and ‘I’m sorrys’ and ‘what ifs.’
“We were always refining her language to take out any permission,” Washington added.
Witherspoon, who was also
starred in and produced HBO’s ‘Big
Little Lies’ and ‘The Morning Show,’ Apple TV Plus
project, knows what resonates and what most people are dying to talk about,
Tigelaar states.
“She has seen a void in
the industry, and she knows exactly how to fill it.”
