Editor's note: Essential is a new series from Dallas Morning News writers spotlighting timeless works of art and culture.
Essential viewing: The Americans, 9 p.m. Tuesdays, FX
The story popped up as one of those irrepressible iPhone alerts. "Why all the alarm over Trump ties to Russia, American millennials ask," blared the headline from the McClatchy news service. God help us, which brings me to the best show on television.
I, too, watch and love This Is Us, which is compelling, emotional drama of the feel-good variety. But I am mesmerized by The Americans, not only for the writing and acting but also its foothold in American history, which is why it remains, four years in, so eerily captivating.
Long before Russia became a player in the 2016 presidential race, The Americans was essential television. For those who grew up during the Cold War, as I did, the memory of duck-and-cover drills and the threat of nuclear holocaust during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis will always be a force, lurking in the shadows of our consciousness. I will never forget the exhibit one fall at the State Fair of Texas, where my father walked through and gave serious thought to buying a backyard nuclear fallout shelter.
Created and produced by former CIA officer Joseph Weisberg, The Americans focuses on a married couple, a pair of Soviet spies masquerading as American suburbanites in sleepy Falls Church, Va. The series begins in 1980, the year Ronald Reagan was elected president. Its current fifth season has propelled the show to 1984, which aside from the George Orwell ironies of such a milestone, marks the re-election of Reagan, who intensified the Cold War with a massive military build-up.
The strength of the show is how it plumbs the depths of our Cold War excesses, the cost it exacted on both countries, financially and spiritually, and the lacerating toll it took on human beings. And because of that, it figures to be, by the end of its run, not just a cool show to watch but one of the best series ever. Aside from the power of its presentation, it dares to answer the question posed by the headline about millennials. But there's more. Regardless of where one sits politically, the underlying message of FBI director James Comey's testimony before Congress this week is that when it comes to the Russians, be afraid. Be very afraid. Their intrusion into American political life may be worse than anyone imagined. As Comey said, they rely often on romance and bribery as tools of coercion, which is nothing new to the cast of The Americans.
British actor Matthew Rhys plays a KGB spy given the American name of Philip Jennings. Keri Russell plays his wife, Elizabeth. The emotional complexity of the storyline lies in the fact that the couple has given birth to two children, neither of whom knew, initially, about what Mom and Dad did for a living. The amazing Holly Taylor plays their teenage daughter, who now knows that Mom and Dad are far more than the guileless travel agents they appear to be. Complicating the story even further is the fact that the Jennings family lives across the street from Stan Beeman, an FBI agent played by the marvelous Noah Emmerich.
Margo Martindale, who grew up in Jacksonville, in the Piney Woods of deep East Texas, won Emmy awards in 2015 and 2016 for her role as a Soviet spy boss on The Americans. Russell, who spent time growing up in Coppell, earned a Golden Globe nomination in 2017 for her role.
We are now in the penultimate season of The Americans, whose finale will air in 2018. We know all about the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. No less an authority than Alfred Hitchcock once said, "There is a distinct difference between 'suspense' and 'surprise.' " The Americans elevates suspense to an art form, but before the series ends, there figure to be plenty of surprises, ones that loom against the backdrop of our own reality.
a gripping serial about Russian operatives working to undermine American democracy. But once you’re done with the news, watch #TheAmericans
— Noah Emmerich (@NoahEmmerich) March 7, 2017
What we don't know is how The Americans will end or what relevance the former Soviet Union will come to have in our own lives in the years ahead. We remain in suspense about the future, hoping, of course, that the surprises in the coming years won't be as grim as that exhibit at the State Fair of Texas suggested they might be.
This is the official trailer for Season 5 of The Americans:
