Lady In The Lake Review: A Mystery Set Adrift

There is, without question, a boatload of talent in "Lady in the Lake," the new Apple TV+ series based on Laura Lippman's acclaimed novel of the same name. The series stars Natalie Portman (who's also an executive producer), and features an ensemble cast that includes one-time "Star Wars" villain Moses Ingram, Y'lan Noel, Wood Harris, and more. It also marks the next major step in the career of writer-director Alma Har'el ("Honey Boy"), who created the series and directed every episode. Just looking at this show's list of credits is enough to get you excited. 

Once you're inside this seven-episode crime drama about the unlikely intertwining of the lives of two very different women, that excitement doesn't exactly fade, but the way the series is laid out does necessitate a certain shift in attitude. While it's based on a story by one of our finest crime novelists and is ostensibly driven by the mystery of the title character's fate, "Lady in the Lake" also wants to be many things at once. It's part mystery, part period drama, part dissection of class and sex and race in mid-20th century America, and part surrealist search for essential truth. 

Some of these elements work better than others, and in the end the biggest problem with the show is a certain sense of overreaching, of trying to be too many things at the same time. That makes it an uneven ride, a show drifting in its own thematic and narrative lake with no clear direction at times. But even when it's not quite working, the sheer amount of talent involved is usually enough to keep you watching.

Natalie Portman plays Maddie Morganstern Schwartz, a Jewish housewife living in an upscale neighborhood in 1960s Baltimore, where she's seen as a community leader. Moses Ingram is Cleo Johnson, a working mother of two living in one of the city's poorer neighborhoods, struggling to make ends meet and determined to care for her children and give them a future. Maddie is a wife, mother, and philanthropist, while Cleo is a wife, mother, bartender, department store window model, bookkeeper, and more. Maddie has everything; Cleo fights for whatever she can get. They're very different, but they're united by a certain sense of fighting for purpose in a world that wants them quiet and obedient.

Maddie and Cleo's lives start to weave together in unexpected ways when a tragedy within her community drives the Jewish housewife to leave her husband (Brett Gelman) and try to pursue her first love of journalism. What Maddie doesn't know, of course, is that the story that drove her to change her life is just one part of a wider web of secrets, crime, and death, all of which will soon envelop her in the mystery of what happened to Cleo one December night to make her into the city's "lady in the lake."

While the show's trailers have set it up largely as a mystery series about Maddie looking for the truth about Cleo, and Laura Lippman's novel largely unfolds from Maddie's point of view, "Lady in the Lake" begins with a slightly different approach. We see Maddie's determination to change her life, yes, but we also see the weeks of Cleo's life that lead up to her becoming "the lady in the lake," from her struggles to be a good mother to her unwilling participation in Baltimore's gambling-centric underworld. We see what she's trying to do, what drives her, and what she really cares about, which makes her eventual fate that much more impactful. For Alma Har'el and her writing team, it's a chance to raise the character stakes, but it ultimately delivers somewhat mixed results.

Front and center in all this are the dual performances by Natalie Portman and Moses Ingram, ultimately the show's greatest strengths. Alma Har'el's camera deliberately mirrors and parallels their lives, sometimes cutting between them until it seems like they're sharing a scene when they're actually on opposite sides of the city. There's a remarkably symmetry to what they're doing, and yet it never feels like they're copying one another or dancing to the same beat. Both Portman and Ingram come to the material with their own sensitivities, their own tones, and their own reactions, and the result is a remarkable two-handed acting showcase.

The series is also, unsurprisingly, a showcase for Har'el, a filmmaker adept at blending the factual with the fictional and therefore perfectly suited for Laura Lippman's story, which was inspired by real-life deaths in 1960s Baltimore. Her camera is constantly highlighting the production design's period details, from neon-adorned storefronts to cheap Christmas decorations lining front porches. Har'el's images are also rich in the psychological truth and language of memory: a photo Maddie sees might trigger a wave of images from past and present, while a single seemingly innocuous event in Episode 1 might mirror something more intense in Episode 5. It's an exceptionally well-assembled show, visually.

Unfortunately, that means certain story issues stand out even more. The mysteries of the plot are never far away from what's happening onscreen, but because we spend so much time with Maddie and Cleo outside of their darker entanglements, the show can sometimes feel like it's slowing down when it should be speeding up. The first half of the show often feels like a period character drama with a little mystery thrown in, not the other way around. That means that when the psychological thriller elements of the story do come in, they can be both jarring and a bit undercooked. It's a tonal problem that makes "Lady in the Lake" feel a bit aimless at times, and strangely hyper-focused in others.

These issues aside, "Lady in the Lake" is a very watchable, often compelling series led by two brilliant actresses who give it their all in episode after episode. It's not necessarily on its way to being the next great Apple TV+ sensation, but if you like period dramas and crime stories, you'll find a lot to love here.

"Lady in the Lake" premieres July 19 on Apple TV+.