This is one of the most anticipated series of the year! After Big Little Lies and The Undoing, Nicole Kidman teams up with David E. Kelley again for Hulu series Nine Perfect Strangers, the first three episodes of which are available in France since this Friday on Amazon Prime Video. The series, which has eight episodes, is an adaptation of another novel by Liane Moriarty, the author of Big Little Lies. With this trio, we hoped for a new masterpiece. Gold, Nine Perfect Strangers does not live up to our expectations.
While The White Lotus – the mini-series, visible on OCS and Amazon Prime Video, is one of the most popular of the summer – placed its assortment of protagonists in a luxurious palace in Hawaii, Nine Perfect Strangers settles her nine souls in pain, gathered to start from scratch, in a sumptuous holistic wellness center, ironically called Tranquillum House.
The place is run by Masha (Nicole Kidman), a mysterious Russian who became, through trauma, a personal development guru. She is supported by her dedicated employees in Mao-collared white uniforms, Yao (Manny Jacinto, the unmistakable Jason de The Good Place) and Delilah (Tiffany Boone, aka Roxy Jones in Hunters).
To camp the nine curists, David E. Kelley has assembled an impressive cast. Oscar-winning actress Melissa McCarthy (the unforgettable Sookie of Gilmore Girls) plays Frances, a best-selling author whose career is running out of steam. In addition, she went through a hard and emotionally embarrassing blow. Regina Hall (Ally McBeal) plays Carmel, a divorced woman who has lost confidence in herself, in fits of rage. Bobby Cannavale (Vinyl) plays the impulsive Tony who became addicted to opiates after an injury. Luke Evans, meanwhile, is Lars, a cynical and jaded homosexual.
Ben (Melvin Gregg) and Jessica (Samara Weaving) are a young couple who are already struggling. Michael Shannon (Richard Strickland in The Shape of Water by Guillermo Del Toro), Asher Keddie and Grace Van Patten form a family trying to overcome grief. On paper, all the ingredients and talents come together to deliver a brilliant event series. So why isn’t the sauce setting?
Nicole Kidman does too much
First bad point: Nicole Kidman does tons of it with her wobbly Russian accent. Her long blonde wig and her supernatural thinness are not enough to explain the incredible magnetism that Masha exerts on people.
The series is the victim of bad timing: the epilogue of The White Lotus, posted on Monday, is still fresh in the memories. She and those who have seen this biting satire, which has gradually deployed all its intelligence and power over the episodes, will not be able to refrain from drawing comparisons. And at this game, Nine Perfect Strangers does not emerge a winner.
A series too applied
In Nine Perfect Strangers, everything seems too conscientious. Series speaks of pain, loss, regret, self-esteem, but in a way too applied and bland to trigger real emotion in the viewer. Aside from the exchanges between Tony and Frances, the dialogues often fall flat. The cracks in the different characters are poorly exploited.
A too slow plot
The aspects of the thriller (the mystery around Masha, her past and her motivations, exposed via hazy flashbacks) fail to be really captivating. And by dint of wanting to make the mystery last and to dilute the revelations on the characters, the first episodes stand still and the intrigues fail to fully captivate, where The White Lotus (one can not help but compare) does not waste a line of dialogue, nor a look.
We feel that the series aims to question the major concerns of our time (addiction to drugs, new technologies, social networks, etc.). The problem is, David E. Kelley and the writers have a hard time integrating everything they want to say into the episodes finely.
A subtext that lacks substance
Nine Perfect Stranger lacks substance because it does not explore what should have been its main theme: the fascinating question of our relentless quest for self-improvement.
The chaos of Tranquillum promises to be predictable and inexorable. Maybe something big awaits the viewer in the last four episodes (which we haven’t gotten to see yet). However, faced with the plethora of series, Nine Perfect Strangers, despite its polished elegance, requires a lot of patience on the part of the public, who may be tempted to seek more captivating elsewhere.