Yahoo News White House Plumbers review: Veep veterans tread familiar political territory
"Gentlemen may talk of the age of chivalry, but remember the ploughmen, poachers and pickpockets whom they lead. It is with these sad instruments that your great warriors and kings have been doing their murderous work in the world." One of the most memorable quotes from the narrator of Stanley Kubrick's 1975 film Barry Lyndon feels like an appropriate description of White House Plumbers, HBO's new five-hour miniseries about the hapless henchmen who carried out the Watergate burglary on behalf of people much more powerful than them.
The details of the Watergate break-in surely need little elaboration here, since it is the definitive scandal of 20th-century American politics and the reason that every controversial incident since gets the suffix "-gate" attached. Even after bringing down the administration of President Richard Nixon, the Watergate scandal has lived on in countless books, documentaries, and screen portrayals. In fact, White House Plumbers isn't even the first time that it's been the subject of a prestigious TV show; that would be Gaslit, which aired on Starz just last year and starred Julia Roberts as early whistleblower Martha Mitchell.
In place of Roberts' movie-star sheen and Gaslit's interest in punished truth-tellers, White House Plumbers focuses on G. Gordon Liddy (Justin Theroux) and E. Howard Hunt (Woody Harrelson), the hatchet men who did Nixon's dirty work and subsequently got chewed under the gears of a conspiracy much larger than themselves. One thing these two contemporary Watergate shows have in common is their refusal to cast an actor to play Nixon, instead relying on archival footage of one of the most disgraced president in American history. It comes across both as an admission that previous Nixon screen performances (such as Anthony Hopkins and Philip Baker Hall) aren't worth competing with, and as a thematic statement that the great men of history often have nothing but contempt for the people who actually carry out their dark designs — as Kubrick said so well.
Phil Caruso/HBO Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux in 'White House Plumbers'
Since all five episodes of White House Plumbers are directed by former Veep showrunner David Mandel and written by Veep veterans Alex Gregory and Peter Huyck, viewers might expect it to have the same venomous verve as that previous HBO political series. Such comedy comes across best with Theroux's performance, as the always-game actor makes the most of Liddy's thick mustache and plays up his documented Nazi sympathies to generate moments of absurdity and awkwardness. Harrelson, by contrast, plays Hunt as a more tragic figure. Even though the show makes note of his (likely, but never confirmed) roles in the assassinations of both Che Guevara and John F. Kennedy, five hours spent with Hunt and his family can't help but generate sympathy for the man, which can leave viewers with an uncertain taste in their mouths.
There's only so much filmmakers can do with real-life material, though — especially people and events as well-documented as the Watergate criminals. Veep's creatively profane dialogue was possible because they weren't stuck to adapting transcripts; as a result, real political events (such as Kevin McCarthy's comically protracted ascent to Speaker of the House, or the more baffling speeches of Vice President Kamala Harris) seem to be following in Veep's footsteps, rather than the other way around.
That's not to say that White House Plumbers is devoid of contemporary resonance. It happens to be premiering on HBO at the same moment that former President Donald Trump is going on trial in New York. That case was made possible by the cooperation of former Trump confidant Michael Cohen, who perhaps realized that — like Hunt and Liddy before him — he was only being used by a man who would dump him at the first opportunity.
White House Plumbers thus tells a clear, coherent story about a famous event in American history, and at just five episodes there's not much bloat to complain of (though it probably could've been made as a movie in an earlier era). But those viewers looking to cackle as they did with Veep probably won't get more than an occasional chuckle. Grade: B-
White House Plumbers premieres Monday, May 1 at 9 p.m. on HBO.
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