A burning house, a distraught mother and the last remnants of a perfect suburban life engulfed in flames. It’s the kind of opening to a series that immediately prompts questions about fault and blame, but Little Fires Everywhere is much more than a search for answers. Instead, every piece of the story becomes fuel to a blaze that was burning away quietly in the lives of those affected long before it was discovered.
Based on American novelist Celeste Ng’s award-winning book, which spent 47 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, and with production credits and starring roles held by Hollywood heavyweights Reese Witherspoon (Big Little Lies, Legally Blonde) and Kerry Washington (Scandal), Little Fires Everywhere has every ingredient in the recipe for success. What it has achieved, however, far surpassed expectations, gaining five primetime Emmy nominations and asserting itself as one of the most compelling dramas of recent times.
The opening scene is just the first indication of what is to come; Little Fires Everywhere is a series that packs serious emotional punch. The crumbling house is a far cry from the carefully curated life the Richardson family have enjoyed up to this point, molded and shaped by Elena Richardson (Witherspoon), a Shaker Heights fixture and family matriarch who is type A in every sense. Elena’s relentless pursuit of perfection is not just a personal project, but one that extends to her husband, Bill (Joshua Jackson), and their four children, as she attempts to pass on a legacy of success and achievement that will preserve the family’s dominance in Shaker. For Elena, life is something to be worked at, and there is no room for complacency. According to her, if you are prepared for anything, you can head off any disaster at the pass. At least in theory.
The picture-perfect lives of the Richardson family, including Elena (Reese Witherspoon), are upended by the arrival of artist Mia Warren, and her daughter. Credit: Erin Simkin / Hulu
Shaker Heights is, in itself, a stronghold of ‘90s American domestic idealism, complete with a neighbourhood watch, precisely manicured lawns and a comforting air of predictability. It would almost seem a parody of itself if not for the authenticity that cuts through thanks to the authorial voice of Ng that resonates throughout the adaptation, herself a former resident of the Ohio suburb.
There couldn’t be a more unlikely place for the nomadic Mia Warren (Washington) and her teenage daughter, Pearl (Lexi Underwood), to choose to settle, but circumstance and creative pursuits have led them straight into a world that demands conformity. An artist and single mother, Mia is the antithesis of the privileged Elena, and conformity is not her style, but when her search for a home sees their paths cross, the Warrens’ and the Richardsons’ lives are quickly interwoven.
Mia (Kerry Washington) finds more than she expects in Shaker Heights. Credit: Erin Simkin / Hulu
With Pearl spending more time with the Richardson children, their shared desire to forge their own path and challenge the worldviews of their respective parents overcomes any difference of upbringing or experience. Though Mia couldn’t be more different from Elena as a person and a parent, she is similar in her desire to shape her daughter’s worldview, fierce in her rejection of the privileged world that the Richardsons inhabit and determined to keep Pearl grounded. Just like Elena, Mia finds herself forced to relent, or risk damaging her relationship with her daughter for good but choosing to do so brings with it an unwelcome permanency to their life in Shaker Heights.
Pearl (Lexi Underwood) and Moody (Gavin Lewis). Credit: Erin Simkin / Hulu
Little Fires Everywhere feels entirely contemporary at times, until pivotal moments that unflinchingly depict the realities of 1990s gender inequality, racial discrimination and social attitudes hand the audience a firm reminder. Though the series inhabits a world of not that long ago, it is one that is clearly many steps behind, evoking a disbelief and discomfort at times that only serves to enhance the implications of these experiences for the characters they impact.
Just as fire has duality, bringing destruction and pain, whilst being the very thing that purifies and cleanses, the sparks that ignite in each instalment of Little Fires Everywhere ultimately lead to an inferno, both literal and metaphorical, that forever changes these two families. Whether the series reveals it to be their undoing, or the making of them, one thing is for certain: the truth can only be hidden for so long.
Little Fires Everywhere premieres Saturday 16 August on SBS On Demand, with all episodes streaming. Episodes also air weekly at SBS VICELAND starting Saturday 16 August at 8.30pm.
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Little Fires Everywhere
