Natalie Portman Dives Deeper Than Whodunit

A bird’s eye view of “Lady in the Lake” may make Alma Har’el’s ambitious new Apple series sound as generic as its title. In 1966, just outside of Baltimore, a young girl is found dead. The woman who discovers her body, an aspiring journalist, becomes obsessed with the case, and it soon leads her to another body, another suspect, and a criminal conspiracy with dangerous ties to cops, politicians, and more.

All of this is true, but none of it is the full truth. Throughout the ethereal, furious, seven-episode limited series, layers are peeled back over and over. Sometimes they reveal new clues about the case. More often, they tell us something about the two women at its center. Yes, two women. Aside from Natalie Portman‘s hungry reporter, Maddie Schwartz — a white woman (of course) whose personal yet picayune connections to the victim spark an outsized obligation to speak on her behalf — “Lady in the Lake” is steered by Cleo Johnson (Moses Ingram), a mother working two jobs to support her sons, one of which leads her into danger and one of which leads her to Maddie.

Unless Maddie is the danger. Taking an either/or question and answering, “why not both?” is a regular occurrence in this winding, atmospheric noir. Within its first hour, “Lady in the Lake” repeatedly challenges our assumptions about heroes and victims, first by upending our understanding of who the title refers to, exactly: There’s the young girl, of course, but she won’t be discovered until the first hour’s final minutes. At the start, there’s a man in a rowboat, dumping the body of a woman into a lake’s fountain, accompanied by Ingram’s mellow voiceover. “Alive, I was Cleo Johnson,” she says. “But in my death, I became the lady in the lake.” Then, directing her words to Maddie, she adds — with just a hint of reproach — “You came at the end of my story… and turned it into your beginning.”

From there, the story jumps back one month in time, but unlike other artificial in media res openings (and, for that matter, other redundant, exposition-heavy bits of voiceover), “Lady in the Lake” wields each of its choices with unmissable purpose. The mystery may take a back seat from time to time, removing too much tension and leaving the dramatic burden on its hard-working leads, and Har’el can get a little too ostentatious with her symbolic gestures. (Cutting the dream sequences and hallucinations would’ve helped with cogency, perhaps even cutting the seven-episode series down to a more stirring six hours.)

But if you can track the tangled plot and set aside the typical priorities of a whodunit (aka asking, “Who, you know, did it?”), “Lady in the Lake” is absorbing from start to finish. Portman’s fearless, uncompromising performance pairs perfectly with Ingram’s steady grip on Cora. A deep bench of supporting stars provides fitting flourishes of their own, and a mesmeric ambiance — conjured by the immaculate production design (JC Molina), snappy costumes (Shiona Turini), and eerie score (by Marcus Norris) — befits this colorful noir perfectly.

After all, despite its murder-durder premise (yes, Portman goes full “wooter” with her Pennsylvanian accent, and it is glorious), Har’el’s adaptation of Laura Lippman’s 2019 novel of the same name isn’t as concerned with finding the killer as it with Maddie and Cleo finding themselves. “Lady in the Lake” is unflinching interrogation of identity forged through the thorny layers of American discrimination. Everywhere they turn, each woman faces misogyny and bigotry. They can’t operate in the world without being allowed to do so by a man, and it becomes pretty clear, pretty fast, that they’ve both had enough.

When we meet Maddie, she’s on the brink of a mid-life crisis. But unlike men who tend to flip out over silly things like not having a good enough job or not winning enough awards, Maddie’s breaking point comes from not getting to do, well, anything she wants to do. She’s a housewife in a Jewish family in the ’60s. Her self-centered husband, Milton (Brett Gelman), doesn’t include her in any decisions. Her asshole of a son, Seth (Noah Jupe), is happy to mock his mother in public and berate her in private. She’s been cooking and cleaning and party-planning her whole life, and guess what? She’s sick of it!

“God forbid you go one day without me serving you,” Maddie seethes toward Milton, as she packs up her suitcase. Back in the city (Maddie lives in the distant suburb of Pikesville), Cleo’s lives an eerily similar life. Her husband, Slappy (Byron Bowers), is a stand-up comic who can’t keep a steady gig and can’t be trusted to keep the kids in line. He’s rather do “research” for his “work” by having the guys over for drinks than keep their son from working with local hustlers, and since he’s not supporting the family financially either, guess what? She’s sick of it! Cleo packs a bag, grabs their kids, and high-tails it for her mom’s house, hoping Slappy will learn his lesson with a little time to himself.

Har’el studiously observes the similarities between Maddie and Cleo, while making sure to note the differences. Maddie can rely on her possessions and privilege to get started with a life on her own. She sells some jewelry, tries to sell her car (but can’t without her husband’s signature), and finagles an apartment from a friend with the promise of future payment. Cleo, however, is still supporting herself and two sons. She needs to keep working. She can’t miss her dayshift at the department store, where she models outfits in display windows, or her nightly gig running numbers at a nightclub with its own local lottery. Also, Maddie is allowed to get mad (and hoo boy, does Portman get pissed). Cleo has to hold back the bulk of her fury.

Cross-cutting between each lead (as Har’el does frequently) reveals less of a mirror image than a distorted reflection. “Lady in the Lake” is hard on Maddie, calling out her blind spots and pushing her to better understand her own ambitions, but she’s not without sympathy. Cleo, our sporadic narrator, is more clear-cut, even when her fate remains murky, and that, too, befits a series intent on examining the layers of American prejudice (both hidden and overt) without giving its characters over to them.

Along their journey, we get to meet a slew of strong actors who carry their scenes well. Mikey Madison, this year’s Cannes breakout in “Anora” (and former “Better Things” star), plays a pot-smoking friend of Maddie’s who says stuff like, “There’s nothing wrong with rolling naked in the grass with a bunch of boys,” typically at inappropriate times. Wood Harris (“The Wire”) guest stars as Cleo’s intimidating boss. David Corenswet (our future Superman and former Ryan Murphy favorite) pops up as the deceased girl’s dad (who has history with Maddie). Josiah Cross makes for a convincing part-time boxer, part-time bruiser with a soft heart, and “Insecure’s” Y’lan Noel wears his Baltimore P.D. uniform smartly enough to tell he’s a bit uncomfortable in the colors.

A bird’s eye view of “Lady in the Lake” may have helped, too. Time jumps and intricate plots can feel taxing and, like many vibe-heavy endeavors, if you aren’t attuned to its rhythms, it’s easy to drift off entirely. But the series is just as easy to admire for how thoroughly it subverts expectations, as well as its exhaustive love for its leads. There’s enough truth here to make the search worthwhile.

Grade: B

“Lady in the Lake” premieres Friday, July 19 on Apple TV+ with two episodes. New episodes of the limited series will be released weekly through August 23.