THE SERIES: "Undercover"
WHEN, WHERE: Premieres Wednesday at 8 p.m. on BBC America
WHAT IT'S ABOUT: Maya Cobbina (Sophie Okonedo) is an English public defender who has steadfastly defended one prisoner on death row in Louisiana for 20 years. Rudy Jones (Dennis Haysbert) insists on his innocence, but time has run out. Back in England, Maya also has a family and husband, Nick (Adrian Lester), waiting for her. She is also in line to become the first black female director of public prosecutions _ a huge job that has put her under scrutiny. One day, a mysterious man, Paul Brightman (Derek Riddell), approaches Nick: He wants to pull the former cop and ace detective back into undercover work. But "undercover" for what?
MY SAY: "Undercover" creator Peter Moffat has been on quite a roll lately. He wrote the British series "Criminal Justice," which was later adapted by Richard Price and Steven Zaillian into HBO's summer standout, "The Night Of." Meanwhile, his series for the BBC, "The Village," is one of TV's more unusual ventures _ life in a small (fictional) town over an entire century that could ultimately turn into a few dozen hours of viewing time. Moffat's an interesting screenwriter with bracing ambitions _ on display here, too.
In one or maybe two superficial ways, "Undercover" and "Night Of" share similar obsessions, most notably truth's funny habit of being so easily subverted by a falsehood. In "Night Of," Nas (Riz Ahmed) may or may not have killed the young woman, but prejudice has poisoned the judicial process of finding out. Likewise, "Undercover" also begins with a presumption of innocence _ Rudy's _ then works backward from there. Once again, race and justice are the big themes, then Moffat throws his curveball: The family at the center of "Undercover" is built on a 20-year-old lie that itself is literally built on the nexus of race and justice. To find out what that lie is, viewers have to work backward, too.
So far you've heard about big ideas and big themes, but what about a big story? That's where "Undercover" gets muddled. Jumping in time and in perspective, "Undercover" is so busy building parallel storylines, then reinforcing those with logic, that the core characters become lost. They're pawns pushed around by forces larger than they are, warily circling each other until they are forced to confront the truth. Both Okonedo's and Lester's performances are excellent, but what's missing is a convulsive, emotional payoff. Even first-rate actors can't make up for what's not there.
BOTTOM LINE: Fine performances and a windy, convoluted yarn.
GRADE: B-
