October 9, 2017

The Deuce “What Kind of Bad?” Review: A Low Draft Number

During the Vietnam War in the late 1960s, the United States military instituted a draft lottery in which eligible men were assigned numbers between 1 and 366 based on your birthday. The lower your number, the greater chance you had of being drafted. Of course, if you were in college or had enough dough, you didn’t have to go (the latter loophole is the subject of CCR’s “Fortunate Son”, btw).

That little bit of historical background is relevant on Episode 5 of The Deuce, “What Kind of Bad?”, when Abby attends a college party where one of her friends is wearing an army jacket ironically and complaining that he’ll never get past the draft once he graduates with a number as low as 74.

Similarly, the characters we’ve grown to love, hate or fear over the last four episodes are seeing their own numbers come up, one-by-one. The question is whether they will answer the call of duty or burn their draft card, give the finger to Nixon and flee the country. So far, only Vinnie and Abby seem to be walking the figurative straight line while everyone else ignores reality and zig zags out of control.

Let’s begin with the good eggs:

Vinnie’s running the Hi-Hat like a well-oiled machine, staying friends with everyone who sits down for a drink and keeping the eclectic crowd from tearing itself apart. If only that were enough. Rudy Pipilo now wants him to take control of a brothel, the business he’s been working out with the city. The mayor’s onboard and the police won’t get involved, save for some phoney raids for show (more on that below). Refusing at first, Vince finally takes Rudy up on the offer for the sake of his construction manager brother-in-law who could drop dead of a stroke if he should return to the job site. So yes, Vince is reluctantly getting himself into the sex trade, but at least it’s for the right reasons.

Abby stands up to the self-centered pimp, Reggie Love (Tariq Trotter) and refuses to wear the Hi-Hat’s “trademark” leotard uniform. She’s fully embracing the female empowerment of the decade and I wouldn’t be surprised if she burns her bra next week. That’s not meant to be an indictment on her character, it’s an expression of admiration for her bravery against the male-centric world that is the entire backbone of the show.

While we’re on the subject of Women’s Lib, journalist Sandra Washington is doing her best to break into the world of pimps and whores, now with the help of Officers Alston and Flanagan. Her pursuit is a worthy and noble one that will probably win her the Pulitzer or some other prestigious writing award, but for now, her editor isn’t on board because it reinforces stereotypes about the African American community, “Just like “Those goddamn ghetto films. Everybody cheering for the pusherman.” One of my favorite lines this week, it’s obviously a reference to the rise of blaxploitation in American cinema with movies like Shaft and Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song. Like Vinnie and Abby, Sandra is continuing on the path she believes to be right, despite the difficulties and naysayers. Sure enough, she’s chatting up Reggie by the end of Episode 5 for $40 an hour.

Now for the bad seeds:

Darlene, taking Abby’s advice (partly) makes a trip home and instead of trying to better her life and reconnect with her family, she returns to Manhattan with a young and impressionable waitress with the promise of getting her a “modeling” job. We all know what that means and soon the poor girl is being gussied up and traded between pimps like a piece of meat for a couple grand.

Candy’s is, uh, “exploring herself” with Jack if you catch my drift. He’s a nice guy and I’m not sure she realizes how lucky she is. Perhaps she’s just too damaged and sexually desensitized to really let someone else in and a great little sequence has him handing her money for a cab after they have sex. Jack, unaware of her vocation, thinks it’s just a nice and chivalrous thing to do while it’s like the ultimate insult to her. Good writing there from Will Ralston and Chris Yakaitis. A later beating from a client who just wants her cash isn’t enough to convince her to find a better, more respectable line of work. Instead, she’s back to meeting with my favorite character, porn mogul Harvey Wasserman and thanks to a total lack of “community standards”, he can start putting film back in the camera again.

Then you’ve got the crooked cops in a time when municipal corruption was rampant in New York. Just when you thought Alston and Flanagan were decent men of the law, Officer Ralph Macchio is throwing them an envelope full of cash into their patrol car. Mention is made of the Knapp Commission, a probe into NYPD corruption made famous by whistleblowers like Frank Serpico. If you haven’t seen the Sidney Lumet-directed Al Pacino 1973 classic about his life, you should. Getting back to our two wayward cops, it’s only a matter of time before they’re found out.

Every person in 1970s New York City is waiting for their draft number to come up whether they know it to not and when it does, they’re faced with a choice: Do what’s right or do what’s easy. They can better their situation or make it worse. Like the “Senator’s Son”, the whores hide behind their pimps while the cops hide behind their power. Some will run when their “draft” number is called while others embrace it wholeheartedly and board that huey chopper bound for the dangerous rice paddies known simply as life.

SONG PICKS OF THE WEEK:

“No Time” – Guess Who (1969)

“I Second That Emotion” – Smoky Robinson & The Miracles (1967)