What would you do if you felt your child was a danger to society? What if you find out your daughter was raped and you see the police are doing nothing to bring justice? And if you distrust the intentions of someone caring for a loved one? The episodes of Accused (premiering March 15 at 10:50 p.m. on AXN) ask the viewer questions and show the protagonist’s chosen answer. But that won’t be revealed until the end. Before that, each chapter begins with the accused in front of the judge, without the viewer knowing what happened or why he is being sentenced. The story, different in each episode, is always told with flashbacks from the defendant’s point of view.
The screenwriter and producer Howard Gordon (New York, 61 years old), responsible for some of the most emblematic titles of recent TV thrillers like Homeland or 24 and who has worked on series like The X Files or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, is in charge of this production which based on a 2010 British novel of the same name. The protagonists of the American chapters include actors such as Michael Chiklis, Whitney Cummings, Margo Martindale, Megan Boone and Billy Porter. Gordon, who has been living in Madrid for a few months, is learning Spanish and will include some Spanish words and phrases in his answers, found the British series to be an attractive format, “simple and familiar” and challenging. “The original series was filmed in the UK 13 years ago and the world is very different now. We are in a moment of revolution in terms of thought, identity, gender, capitalism, truth, social networks… The world is living in crazy times and this series was the perfect opportunity to examine how people are dealing with the world today struggling,” Gordon commented in an interview on March 3 at Sony Pictures headquarters in Madrid.
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The anthology format, with standalone stories told in 45 minutes, allows defendants to move from drag queen culture in Boston to the story of a Navajo activist in New Mexico, and from more dramatic or quasi-tragic episodes to those bordering on the absurd comedy. Compared to the more classic view of police or justice dramas that focus on investigators or lawyers, this proposal offers a different twist from the defendant’s perspective. “There’s no investigation here, it’s just how one moment leads to another and so on until you cross a line of no return. That interested me, the moments that make us human. How does someone become a suspect without being a criminal, a killer, or a gang member, just a normal person?
Michael Chiklis (right), in the first episode of “Accused”. Robyn Cymbaly/Fox/Sony Pictures
The series’ stories present their protagonists with dilemmas that move through the various gray levels of morality. “What I try to do is get at the heart of every story, ‘What would I do if I were in the same situation?’ That’s the central question for each chapter,” says Gordon in Spanish. “I like to start a conversation and get people to ask questions. Not that they have the answers, but the questions,” he continues, returning to English. Accustomed to stories that unfold over multiple seasons with many chapters (24 had eight seasons and two subsequent returns; Homeland also reached eight episodes), telling a full storyline in a chapter’s 45 minutes was a challenge for the screenwriter. “It’s terrible,” he laughs. “But it’s also easier because you’re not holding the same character and story hostage. But it’s like shooting a movie every time. The first six minutes is very important on this show because you have to tell the viewer what the characters are like, interest them in them and start the journey.” “It’s almost like writing a sonnet, you have 14 lines and a beat and you have to stick to it. It’s an exercise in restriction and distillation to become as efficient as possible,” he continues.
tell good stories
Given the results of many of the titles he’s worked on, Howard Gordon seems to have the key to a successful thriller. “Actually, I think it’s important to focus on a great character. You can only experience the action and excitement when you are connected to the character. I think of Carrie Mathison [la protagonista de Homeland, interpretada por Claire Danes] It was very important to know who she was as a person before you cared if she saved the world or not or if she was bipolar. The same goes for the characters of this series or for Jack Bauer [el protagonista de 24, interpretado por Kiefer Sutherland] or even David Duchovny in the X-Files. You have to love the characters or love to hate them. They have to be interesting, three-dimensional people. I work a lot on the characters, I know a lot more about them than what I show then. Where are they from, where did they grow up, what are their relationships like… Even if it doesn’t make it into the script later. And something else fundamental: don’t waste your time,” he adds, adding to the essential ingredients of a good thriller. “And having the right actors, too, because if you cast the wrong person, it’s game over.”
Michael Chiklis, star of the first episode of “Accused”. Steve Wilkie/Fox/Sony Pictures
In times of series abundance, Howard Gordon’s lucky star never goes out. Accused premiered in the United States on the Fox network in January and has garnered the highest ratings for a fictional series debut on free-to-air or cable television for the past three years (excluding the post-Super Bowl launch of The Equalizer in 2021). They’re titles that sound like survivors in the current series scene, where platforms dominate production and conversation. How has this new environment changed the work of Howard Gordon, who has worked in television for more than three decades? “A lot has changed. When Netflix and tech companies like Apple and Amazon moved to Hollywood, everything changed. Since streaming became the new way of watching TV, our work has totally changed: the financial part, the kind of stories that are told… But in the end, a good story is a good story. And you have to tell a good story, that hasn’t changed.”
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