The Wire - The Pager: Out of Sight

The Wire: The Pager

Season One, Episode Five

Directed By: Clark Johnson

Written By: Ed Burns, from a story by David Simon and Burns.

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the previous episode here, or click here to see the total coverage Assume spoilers for the episode.

            I’ve been recently reading Sidney Lumet’s great book Making Movies, all about his pragmatic insight into what a director does. Mr. Lumet was a true artist and a list of his films—12 Angry Men, Serpico, Prince of the City—shows a lot of the precedents in both tone and theme for David Simon and The Wire. But one philosophy stuck with me: Mr. Lumet always believes in coming in under budget, and not just wasting money for the sake of art. He understands his contract to his investors, and part of his creativity comes from such limits.

            The last scene in “The Pager,” directed by Clark Johnson (his third episode) and written by Ed Burns (his first) is a pitch-perfect example of a great scene that may have been limited by budget, but works better because of it. As retaliation for Omar’s rampage on the Barksdale crew, Avon orders a hit on his fellow gang members, and near the end of the episode, a couple of young workers spot Omar’s lover at a pizza joint. Instead of a big chase and murder sequence, all we see are phone calls, being traced through pagers that the police have tapped. All we see are the phone calls and the numbers being written down, but Mr. Johnson knows how to quicken the pace of this, while showing nothing that is inherently cinematic, and not even using music, just the sounds of dial tones, button pressing, and data being processed. When we hear the last phone call, “it’s done,” it’s a brutal end. This sequence—the best in The Wire so far—matches the best of Spielberg and Lumet, and proves you don’t have to show your cards to lay down a cool hand.

The Wire - The Detail: Fast Food Philosophy

The Wire: The Detail

Season One, Episode Two

Directed By: Clark Johnson

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Read about the last episode here. Assume spoilers for the episode.

            The key moment in “The Detail,” the second episode of the HBO produced crime drama The Wire, is a discussion of Chicken McNuggets. D’Angelo and his two colleagues enjoy the fast food morsels, and one states the inventor must be rich. But D’Angelo is smarter than that—he tells the boys the inventor made nothing, and McDonalds reaped the profits. “He’s probably still in a basement making minimum wage,” he remarks. And in “The Detail,” we see the difference between those who make a difference and those who do not, and the treatment they get. The big moment we see this is when McNulty and Greggs (Sonja Sohn) bring in a heroin addict named Bubbles to help indentify key players. Bubbles asks for some money, and McNulty complies, while Greggs, the one who asked for Bubbles’ help refuses. Bubbles is the key player, the one doing the real work, but at the end of the day, he is still at the bottom of a chain of an abusive and destructive system.

            The basement metaphor is literalized in the episode, when the narcotics team gets their new office in the basement of Baltimore’s Police Squadron. The squad gets some new members, all novice, idiotic, or close to retirement, most notably a new kid named Roland ‘Prez’ Pryzbylewski (Jim True-Frost), who accidentally shoots his gun in their new office. The message is clear—nobody wants them to “solve” anything, just smile and get a pat on the head. Although much of the focus remains on McNulty, we get much more of his new boss, Lieutenant Cedric Daniels, played by Lance Reddick. Mr. Reddick is perfect for this role—he’s lean, tall, and has a no-shit attitude about him. When McNulty is about to make a mistake, Daniels comes up to talk to him, and the camera pushes right into Daniels, almost shoving everyone else out of the way. It’s a really notable shot by director Clark Johnson, who otherwise plays the rest of the episode straight.

The Wire - The Target: Kafka Comes to Baltimore

The Wire: The Target

Season One, Episode One

Directed By: Clark Johnson

Written By: David Simon, from a story by Simon and Ed Burns

Read out “The Wire” Project here. Assume spoilers for the episode.

            Or a series that I assumed about the dark and dangerous world of crime along the streets of one of the most destructive cities in the United States, the first episode of The Wire, “The Target,” opens with a humorous parable. Jimmy McNulty, played by Dominic West, listens to the tale of a kid shot for stealing money from a craps game named Snot. Snot would steal the money every week at the end of the game, but was never shot. When asked why he would be allowed each week despite this, the witness tells him, “[You] got to. This is America, man.”

            On one level, a line like this is a deeply profound parable about the twisted nature of the American dream. But on another, this is a ridiculous and hilarious story not far from the works of Franz Kafka and Joseph Heller. The fact that Jimmy repeats the line to his partner as a joke shows that Simon, acting as writer for this pilot episode, knows that the trap he’s laid for us can also be seen as humorous from the right angle.

            Much of “The Target” is about setting up the dangerous world that the characters of The Wire inhabit—where drugs and weapons are as common as water—but it’s also setting up what I believe will be the Kafkaesque nature of the Baltimore streets. Everything is a circle on end, where the choice is either drown oneself in sorrow, or simply laugh.

           
     Consider the impetus for the season, a court case that Jimmy sits in on where D’Angelo (Larry Gillard Jr.) is being accused for murder. The two eye witnesses are lined up, but in walks Stringer Bell, an agent for a powerful crime organization, who simply sits in the back with a fine suit and a leather notebook. The eyewitnesses shut up, and Bell is on his merry way. This is a classic set up and payoff, and its only when Jimmy tries to break the system that everything goes to hell.

            Jimmy explains to the judge that this is one of ten unsolved murders related to Avon Barksdale, the leader of the crime organization. Instead of getting a pat on the back, everyone in his unit is furious—Major Rawls chastises him for making this a case, point two middle fingers at him the entire time. Again, we have a scene built on dark pathos—speaking truthfully, even within the Baltimore Homicide squad, is a one way ticket to hell—but played essentially for laughs.

            On the other side of the street, we also get to follow D’Angelo, who has to pay for his crime, but not through jail time (The other maxim established in this episode, every action has a consequence). D’Angelo is moved from working the towers to the low-rise projects. The visual look is one of absurd fear: it is daylight and children play around, but the addicts in the corners and junk thrown around make it a place of uncomfortable tension. Director Clark Johnson (he’ll direct the next episode, and one more this season), seems very much rehearsed in the style of Sidney Lumet. His camera is never flashy, but it captures details about the streets that hit the realism that Simon is aiding for. It’s also interesting to see a show shot in classic Academy ratio (4:3), so most shows now are shot in widescreen (1.68:1). The environments are more claustrophobic, though the shots not as expressive. It'll be curious to see other directors take on this material. For a pilot, you set the standards, and Johnson lays things out plainly, the way you should in a pilot.

            The last thing I want to point out about this pilot episode is its context in the wake of September 11^th. Jimmy visits a friend in the FBI, who has installed a live feed camera, along with two audio devices, to record a drug operation. This is the kind of supreme work that Jimmy needs, but as his friend reveals, it’s the last drug case in Baltimore—all the other funds are being diverted toward the new War on Terror. While this is a true statement, Simon frames it in this again ironic way; the best force out there to do the job is sent away on another mission. As one character refers to it later, he says not to call the drug war by the lingo; “Wars end.”

            There are a number of other characters that Simon sets up in this opening 60 minutes—many who I didn’t exactly get the names of other characters, or exactly their positions—and boldly, he doesn’t make lay out the details all at first. This is a show that is built on complex relationships between people, places, and words that will slowly reveal themselves. Not all of it will make exact since. But there was never an explanation to why Gregory woke up as a beetle. Sometimes the most painful things are the funniest too.