KILL YOUR ENTHUSIASM (22)
By:
December 4, 2022
One in a series of 25 enthusiastic posts, contributed by 25 HILOBROW friends and regulars, on the topic of favorite killed-off TV characters. Series edited by Heather Quinlan.
VANESSA IVES
For three glorious, glamourous (requires the posh British spelling), plush, glittering, operatic, cinematic, gothier-than-thou seasons Eva Green burned like a bright blue flame as Vanessa Ives in Penny Dreadful. In the very second episode, showrunner/creator John Logan created a magnificent set piece for her at a seance where Vanessa becomes possessed by the spirits of the dead. Her performance in the seance was eerie, heartbreaking, winsome, bestial, terrifying in turn — an actor’s tour de force.
Logan cast the most charismatic performers he could find, movie stars (Josh Hartnett), a James Bond (Timothy Dalton), a legendary Broadway Diva (Patti Lupone), the greatest British stage actress of her generation (Helen McCrory) and Eva Green not only held the screen with them, she owned it. She brought a dark mystique to her character, a wary reserve that pulled you in, but could also play scenes with shattered vulnerability or blistering force. And she did it all in the best wardrobe of any character in the 21st century.
Logan’s decision to kill off Vanessa with a surprise series finale could be defensible in narrative terms. Indeed, Logan claimed he had planned it all the previous year and (like Brutus), Logan is an honorable man. Though at the three-quarter mark in the final season, Logan was introducing new characters, new arcs, new conflicts. Why introduce a Dr. Jekyll and never show Mr. Hyde? Why introduce a new female character, Catriona, at that juncture if you weren’t making an in-season audition to replace Miss Ives? Why develop the central conceit of the entire series as a battle for Miss Ives’ soul between Lucifer and Dracula and then leave it to a damp squib of a finale, Eva Green onscreen for a brief few minutes over the last two episodes, her character meekly capitulating after defying all of hell and the legions of the undead? But Logan said it was all planned out, and Logan is an honorable man.
Or we may infer that there was behind the scenes drama, production money issues, ultimatums from the suits, and a star unwilling to take a pay cut to save the show. Because John Logan didn’t just kill off a character, he attempted a kind of character assassination. But Miss Ives survives in our memory, unsullied, and every fan of the show knows to end their rewatch after the fourth episode of the third season, rejecting Logan’s storyline. It betrays the character.
KILL YOUR ENTHUSIASM: INTRODUCTION by Heather Quinlan | Max Alvarez on LANE PRYCE | Lynn Peril on PETE DUEL | Miranda Mellis on LISA KIMMEL FISHER | Trav SD on COL. HENRY BLAKE | Russ Hodge on DET. BOBBY SIMONE | Kathy Biehl on PHIL HARTMAN| Jack Silbert on MARTY FUNKHOUSER | Catherine Christman on MRS. LANDINGHAM | Kevin J. Walsh on YEOMAN JANICE RAND | Heather Quinlan on DERMOT MORGAN | Adam McGovern on LT. TASHA YAR | Nick Rumaczyk on BEN URICH | Josh Glenn on CHUCKLES THE CLOWN | Bart Beaty on COACH | Krista Margies Kunkle on JOYCE SUMMERS | Kelly Jean Fitzsimmons on DENNY DUQUETTE | Marc Weidenbaum on SGT. PHIL ESTERHAUS | Michael Campochiaro on GORDON CLARK | Fran Pado on EDITH BUNKER | Mark Kingwell on OMAR LITTLE | Bridget Bartolini on ALEX KAMAL | David Smay on VANESSA IVES | Tom Nealon on JOSS CARTER | Michele Carlo on FREDDIE PRINZE | Crockett Doob on AUNT LOUISE.
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