Copyright standard
It’s pretty impressive that All’s Fair, Ryan Murphy’s new show starring Kim Kardashian in the lead, debuted to such terrible reviews. The Guardian gave it a crushing zero stars, and it sank like a stone, to a stinking zero per cent on Rotten Tomatoes. But on social media, the reaction has been wildly different. People are already sharing their favourite, most outrageous quotes and hailing it as a camp cult classic that should be renewed for as many seasons as possible. Why the disconnect? Well, perhaps All’s Fair isn’t for the critics. Murphy has managed to create an entirely new genre perfectly suited to the doomscrolling audience that can barely follow a plot. It’s a mash-up of scripted reality TV (Keeping Up With The Kardashians by way of Selling Sunset, with lots of tracking shots of expensive cars and properties) and OTT fashion-comedy in the vein of A Simple Favour, via RuPaul’s Drag Race. It’s enormous fun, if uneven in places — not a criminal offence, but strange when it has a stacked cast and an experienced producer. But then, this is not a show that wants you to engage your brain. It’s the television version of a Xanax washed down with big glass of wine. All’s Fair centres on powerful female divorce lawyers going to war against super rich men, and each other. Ten years before the main action takes place, Allura Grant (Kim Kardashian), Liberty Ronson (Naomi Watts) and Emerald Greene (Niecy Nash) strike out on their own from their mentor Dina Standish (Glenn Close) to form their own divorce law firm that is a feminist paradise, free from boorish male lawyers. In the present day, they’re raking in the cash representing women who want to take their terrible husbands to the cleaners. It’s camp. When they win a case, they toast with champagne — or as they call it, “victory fizz”. And yes, they all have Drag Queen names — that’s a feature not a bug. The characters vary. Watts’ Liberty is a lady English detective crossed with Legally Blonde’s Elle Woods. Nash is, upsettingly, typecast as a sassy black woman sidekick whose private detective skills help the others unearth the peccadilloes of men trying to wriggle out of pre-nups. Kardashian can’t physically emote, so Murphy has given her a lot of deadpan one-liners and we are treated to endless shots of her famous bottom sashaying out of shot. Every plot, such as it is, is fully nuts. In the opening to the second episode, a potential client throws herself off a balcony during a vape break because the girlboss trio can’t help her. So they take a luxurious private jet (half the scenes take place on PJs) to go to a jewellery auction to bid on some brooches. Self care! Meanwhile, Allura’s marriage to a very hot and stupid NFL player is about to blow up in her face because he’s cheating on her with her protégé, Milan (Teyana Taylor). When he asks for a divorce, it’s their old foe Carrington he goes to, setting everyone on a sweary collision course. All’s Fair can’t decide if obscene wealth is hideous or aspirational. The male tech bros and rich WASP-y men who mistreat their soon-to-be-ex wives are lampooned, and we all cheer. But the lady lawyers are also in it for the bottom line, flaunting their tasteless couture clothes and cackling over piles of diamonds. Given that, as a society, we can’t stop admiring billionaires while they trash our politics and planet, this tracks with the zeitgeist. Feminism is just getting richer than the boys. Murphy is a marmite showrunner. If you hate Glee and American Horror Story (where he first cast Kardashian) and Doctor Odyssey, this is not going to float your boat. The script is absolutely ludicrous, crass and full of creative insults that make little sense if you don’t understand gay humour/slang. At one point, Emerald tells Allura that the latter has terrible taste in men because she likes “rough trade”. For those who don’t know, this does not mean what you think it means. But come on. Where else could you see an actor of Watts’ pedigree uttering the immortal line: “from cock rings to cocktails, all in 24 hours”? The critics may hate it, but the girls and the gays are going to get wine drunk and watch every single episode. I know which side is going to have more fun. All’s Fair is streaming now on Disney
