Give me what I want and give it freely… And I’ll go away.
Sweet old Martha Clarendon. You know her. She used to teach your cousin piano on that old monster she kept in her back room. She stopped the lessons, couldn’t get around ya see. She broke her hip a while back and wasn’t spry to begin with. Watches TV and worries now. Your Aunt will occasionally check on her. You’ve know her as long as you’ve known anyone. Everyone has. Sweet old- good old Martha Clarendon.
Died bludgeoned to death by a stranger with a cane. Her face lies next to her on the floor.
The man’s being held at Anderson’s store, our town constable. It’s what we pay him for isn’t it? Except, this man is different ya can tell. He knows things. Things he has no business knowing. And help ain’t on the way.
Cause a Storm’s coming. One hell of a storm.
Stephen King’s Storm of the Century novel for television has been out for almost twenty years. It follows an island community bracing itself for the worst storm in generations when a murderer comes among them. Cut off from the mainland they soon realize this prisoner is more dangerous and far less human than he appears. And he wants something, and if he doesn’t get it he will punish them all. To say I am a fan of Stephen King would be an understatement. In his own distant and financially unsupported way he helped raise me. The Stand was the miniseries my Mother put on when I was sick from school. The Shinning, IT, Salem’s Lot, Needful Things, Cujo, and The Dark Half were my favorite books in middle school to act as pleasant diversions to the horror around me. Now that I’m older my tastes have changed, I’m no longer the horror fanatic I was. I think Green Mile is a gem, and his short story collections are inspiring. Under the Dome may be his best work.
But Storm of the Century is my favorite.
Part of this is a question of medium; I am a theatre practitioner for a reason. Call it the limitations of a simple mind but actually hearing the varied tones and voices of King’s Little Tall Island provides me its own symphonic moments. Yes, Derry of It and Dreamcatches exhales a menace of small town violence that needs no monster to be familiar. Castle Rock breeds a Yankee arrogance of isolated capability, a sanguine peace easily shattered by true terror: a rabid dog, serial killer or devil. King dots these places with Nettie Cobbs, Pop and Ace Merrills, Beavers, Big Jims, and Alan Pangborns.
But listen to the residents of Little Tall. Listen to those voices. See their wrinkles, frozen breaths on the air, glances to the side when no ones looking. These aren’t men and women on a page drawn from our own innumerable voices and experiences but fundamentally ours. They are their own to be taken as they are.
“For God’s sake Michael Anderson don’t you have any plain hamburger meat?”…
“Come town meeting we might just have a change in law(r) enforcement round here.”…
“Oh, we’re having a baaallllll”….
“What about our baby? The one you murdered?”
“Don’t be smaart Michael Anderson.”
This commotion must serve as the backdrop for us to see the men and women who represent the whole. To hear the voices that rise above the cacophony. To feel… feel the silence and the monster who inspires it.
And this we do. So contrary to standard reviewing practice I’m not going to start with our handsome lead, his intelligent wife, or the repulsive villain. Their heroism, villainy, betrayals do not exist in the vacuum of the storm but the debate of the town hall.
Becky Anne Baker’s as Ursula Godsoe provides the heart of Little Tall Island. Ursula’s natural leadership, common sense, work ethic, and “psychic twinkle” make her not only one of the most interesting ensemble characters in this miniseries but of any work I’ve seen. Even the “official” leaders of the town Michael and Robbie either bow or turn to her for advice. Baker’s portrayal eschews easy suburban cliches of helicopter/PTA mother for the older arch typical community woman. Her family has been on the island as long as any. She knows the people as well as any. She knows the history better then most. She gives orders and people follow because it’s gotta be done. She’s quick tonged, brave, and not easily intimidated. When she looses her husband she goes on, when her daughter is taken she thinks clear. Ursula is the best of the island.
Countered with town manager Robbie Beals (Jeffery Demunn) who is the worst. Robbie Beals delights in the imagined Little Tall. The Little Tall that didn’t gather in a Town-hall during a storm like a bunch of “cave people scared of the lightening.” The Little Tall where he is the first man to solve problems, dish out advice, and proclaim the final word on the matter, thank you very much. His part of the community allows him to define his position literally, “I am town manager after all.” Little Tall government exists for him to define his own superiority. These qualities are somehow made worse by his virtues. He is not a stupid man, weak or cowardly. But like all hypocrites who stand in judgement he is unmanned by visions of how he views himself.
The others in the town are equally well written and lovingly portrayed. Each carrying a different part of the communities soul. Kat and Billy (Julianne Nicholson and Jeremy Jordan) are the next generation coming apart at the seams. Molly Anderson (Debrah Farentino) town nurturer and darkly pragmatic voice to her husband. Good kind Alton Hatcher (Casey Siemaszko) the only character to spend hours and hours in the presence of Andre Linoge without a single dark secret coming to light and to simple to realize it. Then there is Jack Carver (Steve Rankin). Whose first image illustrates a loving father gently playing a Celtic melody on his mandolin, joking with his handsome son and grinning at his pretty wife. Counter this with his final shot in a bathtub, police cameras flashing and a bag over his face.
These journeys are not only important because they provide the oft quoted little understood “flavor” but because it shows the island is more than any one person. The decisions of the many impact the lives of the few. This is not political it is fact.
Michael Anderson learns this. Timothy Daly’s leading man, Michael Anderson, is a man of his town but already not quite a part of it. College educated with a tendency to be “smaart.” He’s got the respect of his peers but isn’t found socializing much beyond his friend, Hatch. Daly’s Anderson is a good man without falling into perfection. Reasonably competent as talented men who’ve not been pushed often are. His ties to the community are his store, wife, son, and friend. He looses it all by the final snowfall.
Andre Linoge. The devil or demon walking among us is not new to King. I know of no other author who does it as well. Randall Flagg, Leland Gaunt, the dark man, are all demons with nefarious intent. But Linoge is different. Linoge with his foreign name and stylish but not weather appropriate outfit. He walks in town with a disdained look not happy about his parochial surroundings but like a salesman greets them all as if they were friends.
And like any great salesman he pushes. He pushes hard. He beats little old Martha Claranton to death personally. He invades the minds of Peter Godsoe and Loyd Wishman simultaneously forcing their suicide. He forces Kat Withers to beat her beau to death with his cane. Forces another old lady to stick her head into a public bathroom sink drowning herself. All this before he ever escapes from his jail cell. All this when they are miles away in a storm. All this while leaving the message over and over again.
Give me what I want and I’ll go away.
Always be closing baby. Always be closing.
He knows his clients and he makes sure they know it. Their darkest secrets are revealed for all to hear. “How’d the abortion go?” “Selling marijuana wholesale?” “Beat that gay man within an inch of his life.” These secrets don’t tear the town apart. To the contrary they’re brought closer together. Watching each others backs like good neighbors. Well, except maybe that Michael Anderson. He’s got nothing serious. Maybe he’s different than us. He forces them to respond to him not as individuals but as a group. Linoge’s sales pitch is for everyone. When he finally tells them his price. He gives them a half an hour. No time.
Always be closing.
Never mind the cracks. Never mind the inconsistencies. Never mind his confession that he is in fact old and dying. Never mind that he only invaded the minds of isolated people. Never mind that his evil will now spread. And especially never mind that only a few in town will be directly impacted.
This is a community matter now. Michael Anderson cannot remove himself, Hatch cannot remove himself, the others in town are all party. This is what happens when a town comes together in the worst of times. They make a choice. They do the right thing for as many people as possible.
And they damn themselves.
This is a rough series. But once again King’s monster only forces a real darkness that can exist in any place. When power is vested in the many and none of the options look good. When the best of the town, Ursula, turns on Anderson because that’s what needs to be done even when they are wrong. Even when the action is evil.
But the storm lifts, the monster leaves and the community goes on.
Even when it leaves us behind.
Until next time,
Lane McLeod Jackson
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