You’d should have been dwelling beneath a rock to have missed it: Nicole Kidman’s newest outing as a fierce matriarch embroiled in a homicide thriller in The Excellent Couple, Netflix’s new, massively trending miniseries.
With a forged completely packed-full of stars, together with Dakota Fanning, Isabelle Adjani and Liev Schreiber, a fantastically outrageous and actually unlikely plot (which entails a rich household’s difficult relationships, and a homicide) and the suitably beautiful setting of Nantucket, it’s no actual shock that over the weekend the present has change into an on the spot hit.
For these simply tuning in now, right here’s the whole lot to deliver you in control about one in all this yr’s largest reveals.
What do we all know concerning the plot?
Eve Hewson
Seacia Pavao/Netflix
Based mostly on Elin Hilderbrand’s 2018 novel of the identical identify, The Excellent Couple is a couple of rich household’s involvement within the demise of a visitor forward of a lavish marriage ceremony.
Greer Garrison Winbury (Kidman) is a novelist who appears to have all of it: fame, riches and a picture-book household – not least her sizzling husband, Tag Winbury (Liev Schreiber). And one in all her sons is about to get married to the attractive Amelia Sacks (Eve Hewson). What may go flawed?
Nicely, like all of the juiciest dramas, everybody appears to be harbouring a secret or two: from affairs, to cash issues, to suicide makes an attempt, to extra affairs. Police begin to examine a demise that occurs on the property within the early morning hours after the marriage rehearsal dinner – may it have been a homicide, somewhat than an accident? – and the fraught relations between the members of the family solely intensify.
Who stars in The Excellent Couple?
Sam Nivola and Nicole Kidman
Liam Daniel/Netflix
The forged is star studded: in addition to Kidman, Schreiber and Fanning, Irish actor Hewson, who starred in Dangerous Sisters and is the daughter of U2 frontman Bono, performs bride-to-be Amelia. She’s joined by British actor Billy Howle, who’s best-known for The Seagull and Outlaw King, The White Lotus’ Meghann Fahy, Loopy Ex-Girlfriend’s Donna Lynne Champlin, MidSommar’s Jack Reynor and Ishaan Khatter.
Meghann Fahy and Liev Schreiber
SEACIA PAVAO/NETFLIX
Sure, we’ve popped it on the high of the web page. The 2-minute clip units the scene for the tantalising six-parter. “They’re wealthy,” says somebody talking off-camera. “Kill-someone-and-get-away-with-it-rich.” Then we see the household consuming beers, grimacing and laying by the pool trying mildly distressed because the police began to collect proof concerning the terrible “accident”.
“It’s such a shock and we’re all very upset,” says Kidman’s Greer, in a flat, impassive voice, whereas making use of lip-salve.
With the teaser trailer racking up three million views, and the full-length trailer over a million views, it’s actually no shock that the sequence has been making waves on-line since its September 5 launch: one fan summed up the joy succinctly: “Knives Out meets Huge Little Lies meets White Lotus. I am in.”
Meghann Fahy and Liev Schreiber
SEACIA PAVAO/NETFLIX
The present has been developed by actor-writer Jenna Lamia, who has featured in episodes of Regulation and Order, NYPD Blue and Soiled John and has written episodes of 90210, Good Ladies and Resident Alien.
Requested by Netflix’s official content material web site, Tudum, about her aspirations for the sequence, Lamia mentioned she hoped audiences would watch the present with “bated breath and needing to maintain going, as a result of they will’t stand that they’re undecided who did it but. However I hope they’ll additionally chortle!”
The Excellent Couple has been directed by Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier, who directed HBO’s The Undoing (which additionally starred Kidman) and Showtime’s The First Woman.
“Every thing I’ve performed, I’ve at all times been very meticulous concerning the world being appropriate, but in addition the characters being particular as a result of what by no means works is that if it turns into generic,” Bier informed Tudum. “You should perceive the world.”
What have the critics mentioned?
Donna Lynne Champlin and Michael Seaside
LIAM DANIEL/NETFLIX
The present has been selecting up massively various evaluations. The Customary, for instance, gave it simply two-stars, describing it as a “shiny whodunnit” that’s “extra model than substance”.
Others have disagreed, with critics describing The Excellent Couple as “ludicrously good”, “the drama of the season” and “schmaltzy, foolish and really soapy” however with a “compelling plotting”, that “could have you hooked”.
The Excellent Couple is at the moment streaming on Netflix