2 l April
19 - 25, 2020
Northeast Oregon TV Weekly
BY GEORGE DICKIE
Michelle Dockery,
Jaeden Martell and
Chris Evans star in
“Defending Jacob,”
premiering Friday
on Apple TV+.
Murder rocks a suburban
Boston town and family in Apple’s
‘Defending Jacob’
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A popular teen’s murder rocks a leafy
Boston suburb and a prosecutor finds himself
conflicted when his son is accused of the crime
in a drama series that premieres this week on
Apple TV+.
In “Defending Jacob,” an eight-episode
limited series that begins streaming Friday,
April 24, Chris Evans (“Gifted,” the “Captain
America” movie series) stars as Andrew
Barber, assistant district attorney in Middlesex
County, husband of Laurie (Michelle Dockery,
“Downton Abbey,” “Good Behavior”), head
of a local private school, and father of Jacob
(Jaeden Martell, “Knives Out,” “St. Vincent”),
by all appearances, a normal, happy junior
high schooler.
When popular classmate Ben Rifkin is
stabbed to death apparently on his way school,
none of the kids interviewed want to give
up any information. But multiple texts from
other teens accuse Jacob of the crime, thus
getting the police’s attention and placing Andy
between the law he has sworn to uphold and
the love for his son.
“The heart of this story is about a family,”
executive producer/director Morten Tyldum
explained to a recent gathering of journalists
in Pasadena, Calif. “It’s about a family who’s
experienced this extraordinary situation, this
nightmare, this thing that both tears them
apart and pulls them together in some way.
And you really need to feel for them and you
need to believe it 100 percent that this is a
family. ... And it’s the little things, it’s the small
things, and how they touch and feel and talk
and look and behave around each other, that
suddenly (makes this) a family you believe in.”
Best known for his action roles in Marvel
films, Evans has drawn critical acclaim for
turns in recent dramatic productions such
as “Knives Out” and “Gifted.” Here, the
unmarried, childless actor takes on the
emotional rigors of playing a parent in crisis, a
challenge that he embraced.
“There’s body language there, there’s
postures, there’s so many things that ... I drew
from my own childhood of what a dad looks
and feels like,” he says. “I really, really, really
enjoyed it, actually, because it really does lend
itself to the complexity and depth of the film. I
think being a parent, I would imagine, unlocks
depths of love that you didn’t know you were
capable of. And I think that only raises the
stakes and makes things more interesting. So
for me, it was a fun place to start off that kind
of blinding love at times and how far you
would go to keep it pure.”
Dockery, also a singleton with no offspring,
agrees.
“Like with any role, you have to immerse
yourself in the character and ... you kind of
observe others,” the actress says. “I felt like it
was very easy for us to sort of become a family
on set. We all had a really lovely time together
in spite of the intensity of the subject matter.
... I feel like we bonded very quickly, and I
think that comes across on screen.”