Small
towns harbor big secrets in prestige TV, and so it is in "Mare of Easttown," a showcase for Kate Winslet that resembles "Broadchurch" in the broad strokes, before establishing its own distinct personality. Slow to start, the limited series gains momentum while mostly providing Winslet a fine star vehicle a decade after her Emmy-winning turn in HBO's "Mildred Pierce." Winslet's Mare is a detective in the town where she grew up and was once a high-school basketball star, crankily living with her mom (Jean Smart), daughter (Angourie Rice) and a young grandchild born to her late son. Ill-tempered and dour, the reasons for Mare's perpetually foul mood gradually become clear, along with the contours of a case that involves a missing girl and a murder, neither of which are exactly common occurrences in this Pennsylvania community.
Like its British predecessor "Broadchurch," having a cop with local roots complicates the investigation, and Mare gets paired up with an outsider (Evan Peters), who understandably worries that she's a little too close to some of those potentially involved.
Still, "Mare" is as much about the protagonist's personal life as the crime part, with Mare meeting a new guy (Guy Pearce, another "Mildred" holdover) and chafing over the fact that her ex-husband (David Denman), who lives a stone's throw away, appears to be getting on with his life.
To say the mix of elements has a familiar whiff would be an understatement, but writer Brad Ingelsby ("The Way Back") and director Craig Zobel ("The Leftovers") have managed to put them together in a compelling way once the show begins to disgorge some of those aforementioned secrets.
"My life's complicated," Mare says when she Pearce's character, a novelist who has recently moved to town, and for once, that's not just the customary hyperbole.
Given Winslet's talent and pedigree -- adopting a very particular accent that, like everything else here, takes a little getting used to -- one suspects the pay channel would have agreed to let her read the phone book. The fact "Mare" actually pays off as a more low-key addition to the genre that HBO gulped down with "Big Little Lies" and "The Undoing" feels like a happy bonus.
"Mare of Easttown" ultimately yields a better production than the description probably sounds -- proof that with this sort of endeavor, it's not always so much about the ingredients as how you put them together.
