You could do much worse than re-adapting a best-selling novel whose critiques of predatory health insurance suits have only grown more relevant since it was published.
Back in 1997, John Grisham’s best-selling legal thriller The Rainmaker was previously made into a well-received (if somewhat underrated) Francis Ford Coppola film starring Matt Damon.
At the time, it was following on the heels of other buzzy ’90s Grisham adaptations, from The Pelican Brief to The Client. These days, Paramount is pulling from its existing IP library to pad out USA’s scripted storytelling. Unfortunately, the latest Rainmaker is a scattered reimagining that gets too caught up in expanding the pulp of Grisham’s story to deliver a legal drama that stands out from the crowd.
Like previous iterations, The Rainmaker, premiering on USA Aug. 15, centers on young lawyer-to-be Rudy (Milo Callaghan), who soon finds himself at odds with local legal lion Leo Drummond (John Slattery).
In this version, Rudy gets fired from Drummond’s prestigious firm after his boss draws him into a public, heated debate on his very first day (and Drummond claims he loves a go-getter!). Suddenly desperate for a job, Rudy ends up working for the one person that will have him: Jocelyn “Bruiser” Stone (Lana Parrilla), whose decidedly more disreputable firm operates out of a former fast food restaurant.
Bruiser might be a self-admitted ambulance chaser, but there’s no denying she has a knack for winning cases and bringing in boatloads of cash in the process—a talent she refers to as “rainmaking.” When she tasks Rudy with finding potential clients, he tracks down Dot Black (Karen Bryson), a grieving mother who insists that her late son—a recovering heroin addict who supposedly died from flu complications—was actually killed through intentional medical malpractice. (In the original, he died after the Blacks’ insurance company refused to cover a life-saving surgery.)
Showrunner Michael Seitzmann, whose previous credits include Intelligence and the medical procedural Code Black, wastes no time adding considerable suds to Grisham’s already-soapy thriller. In five episodes provided for review, this version of The Rainmaker adds a tragically deceased older sibling, a love triangle, and multiple affairs. TV veterans Slattery and Parrilla manage to keep the show from veering off the rails, chewing the scenery as the not-quite-devil and not-quite-angel on Rudy’s shoulders. When they take over, the series becomes something akin to a promising Shonda Rhimes procedural.
Credit where credit is due: This iteration adds shades of nuance to its female characters. In the original Rainmaker, the women are largely defined by the tragic circumstances they find themselves up against, whether it be Dot’s loss of her son or Rudy’s love interest Kelly’s (Robyn Cara) abusive marriage.
In addition to Parrilla’s oodles of charisma, the inclusion of Rudy’s law school girlfriend Sarah (Madison Iseman)—a minor character in the novel—as Drummond’s new protegé adds some juicy interpersonal layers to his and Rudy’s conflict, while more subtly teasing out The Rainmaker’s preoccupations with classism’s effect on justice.
Rounding out the ensemble is P.J. Byrne as Deck Shifflet, Bruiser’s fast-talking, unabashedly shady paralegal. Unfortunately, this version of the character is saddled with crass quips that skew more late-stage Joss Whedon than Saul Goodman. At the very least, his presence gives Rudy, who’s too often stuck playing the show’s sole straight man, an opposites-attract dynamic to bounce off of.
While the Rainmaker series doesn’t purport to have the same self-seriousness that its predecessors had, it could’ve coasted on its soapy procedural charms and name-brand recognition. That’s what makes its choice to introduce a wild, true crime-esque new conspiracy to Grisham’s tale particularly confounding.
Instead of zeroing in on the systemic evils and legal disillusionment at the heart of the original story, the show becomes far more interested in the evil, interconnected deeds of a dastardly new big bad than in bringing The Rainmaker’s timely hook into the 21st century.
What would it look like if, in between salacious lawyerly spats, Seitzmann’s adaptation questioned the ways in which America’s medical racism and lack of accessible care led to Dot losing her son? Maybe the final five episodes will flesh that out amid its conspiratorial rabbit hole, but the initial run certainly doesn’t. What’s left is a jumbled cross between a legal drama, a soap, and a true crime series that ultimately doesn’t manage to say much at all.
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