Looking over my notes on the episode, I’m struck by, well, how struck I was by Julian and Sunday’s kindness toward strangers. Even while fucked up on booze and coke, Julian personally carried that dog to the vet, made sure his owner knew where he was, and footed the bill for the pup’s treatment. He’s just as careful with Anne’s feelings as he is with the dog’s physical well-being. And even though his mother initially fled Sunday, the detective waits until she returns, carefully nurses her back to health, and apologizes for wrongfully accusing Julian of the murder he went to prison for. Underneath their diametrically opposed (and morally dubious, depending on your point of view) jobs, they’re both decent people.
And again, the show plays to O’Donnell’s strengths as a comedian in particular. She’s hilarious when Isabelle gives her a drink that’s more fruit than water. She’s hilarious when she tries and instantly, I mean within five seconds, fails to chase his mother into the desert. (“Stop running! Slow down!” she hollers at the fleeing woman as she herself, you guessed it, slows down and stops running.) She’s hilarious with Paloma, as she repeats the reasons she doesn’t have a partner either at work or in life verbatim: “I’m cranky, I’m set in my ways, and I like to work alone.”
As for Bernthal, the dude gets seriously sexy in this episode too — a less surprising element of the show than the kindness or the comedy, perhaps, but a vital one. I loved the way he instinctively smiled when he said “Hi” to Anne during their first phone conversation, as if his ladykiller charm cannot be switched off even when he’s alone. The sex scene in the bathroom is both hot and, well, kind of disgusting, as hot things can sometimes be; Anne winds up in bare feet, one of them resting on the toilet seat, as they bang against the wall.
I reviewed tonight’s episode of American Gigolo for Decider.
Tags: american gigolo, decider, reviews, TV, TV reviews