L.A. Law
by David Krell
david@davidkrell.com
The 1980’s was the Decade of the Peacock.
As the mother of all media approached four decades in the modern era A.B. (After Berle or post-1948), NBC’s avian emblem emerged like a phoenix, symbolizing pride throughout the environs, annals, and corridors of 30 Rockefeller Center (’30 Rock’) and 3000 West Alameda Avenue in midtown Manhattan and beautiful, downtown Burbank respectively, not to mention 200+ affiliates and O & O’s (network owned and operated stations) across the country.
NBC built its prime time lineup into a tower of strength in the Reagan Era. The powerhouse programs delivered high quality and high ratings under the aegis of chief programming architect Brandon Tartikoff and material suppliers including Gary David Goldberg (Family Ties), Susan Harris (The Golden Girls), and Steven Bochco (Hill Street Blues).
This programming renaissance did not happen overnight. Team Tartikoff had to overcome several regrettable and forgettable offerings: Lewis & Clark, Jennifer Slept Here, Supertrain, Misfits of Science, Pink Lady and Jeff, Mrs. Columbo / Kate Loves A Mystery, and Manimal. It did so, slowly but surely.
Hill Street Blues debuted in 1980.
Family Ties and St. Elsewhere debuted in 1982.
Night Court, The Cosby Show, and Miami Vice debuted in 1984.
The Golden Girls debuted in 1985.
In 1986, NBC responded to the segment of the population known as ‘young, urban professionals’ to demographers and ‘yuppies’ to lexicographers by debuting a show directly targeted to this most desired section of the consumer populace: L.A. Law. Brandon Tartikoff summarized the back story on L.A. Law in his 1992 autobiography, The Last Great Ride.
That show came out of a very brief meeting with Steven Bochco in 1985 -- and it proves that simple ideas are often the most powerful ones. ‘Hill Street is about eighty-five percent cops and fifteen percent lawyers,’ I said. ‘Why don’t we flip the proportions and see what happens?’
What happened was a show with multi-dimensional characters and real-life issues, thereby completing NBC’s cops-doctors-lawyers drama trifecta with Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere. Steven Bochco and Terry Louise Fisher created L.A. Law. It won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series four times in its eight-year run from 1986-1994.
NBC aired the pilot in an unusual fashion, the programming strategy indicating the network’s faith. L.A. Law debuted on September 15, 1986 in NBC’s Monday Night at the Movies time slot from 9:00 pm to 11:00 pm. In an NBC press release dated August, 27, 1986, Tartikoff promoted the scheduling decision.
L.A. Law is a very special show. We think this is an innovative and unprecedented way to get maximum sampling of an extremely attractive program.
The pilot achieved a 21.2 rating and 33 share.
In addition, NBC rebroadcast the pilot on September 27, 1986 in the time slot usually reserved for Saturday Night Live plus an extra half-hour -- 11:30 pm - 1:30 an. For its first season, L.A. Law aired on Fridays in the 10:00 pm - 11:00 pm time slot following Miami Vice. During its remaining seven seasons, L.A. Law aired on Thursdays at 10:00 pm - 11:00 pm.
An attempt to list all the outstanding moments, accomplishments, and awards of L.A. Law would not do it justice (pun intended), but a few select pieces evidence a show featuring multi-layered characters, compelling story lines, crisp writing, and solid acting. Let us proceed.
L.A. Law opened its debut episode with a montage of a Los Angeles trademark, a freeway traffic jam. Tightly written, the pilot successfully introduces, establishes, and highlights the lawyers at the tony law firm McKenzie Brackman Chaney & Kuzak.
On the Tuesday morning after Labor Day weekend, family lawyer Arnie Becker (Corbin Bernsen) flirts with a fellow freeway traveler, his vanity license plate describing his profession -- LITIG8R.
Upon arriving at the home base of McKenzie Brackman et. al., a disgruntled ex-husband confronts the sometimes weasel-like attorney with a gun. Arnie represented the ex-wife in the divorce. Ultimately, the scare tactic worked, though Arnie soon discovers the gun is a starting pistol. Then, Arnie and his secretary Roxanne Melman (Susan Ruttan) discover the dead body of firm partner Norm Chaney (Loren Janes) in his office. Apparently, he fell asleep while eating dinner in his office, the body remaining over the holiday weekend.
Arnie immediately illustrates his personality with dialogue succinctly reflecting office politics, an L.A. Law staple. If he is [dead], I’ve got dibs on his office. Cut to theme music and the infamous vanity license plate bearing the show’s title.
Michael Kuzak (Harry Hamlin) represents Justin Pregerson (Tom O’Brien), the son of a blue-chip client, on charges of rape. The alleged victim is Adrienne Moore (Alfre Woodard). Her outburst in the courtroom results in a contempt of court citation and some jail time to cool off, calm down, and eventually apologize to the court. When Kuzak lands in jail for failure to pay $4,200 in parking tickets, he finds himself in a cell adjoining Moore’s.
Kuzak defines, delineates, and defends his role as a lawyer, despite his misgivings. I represent the system as well as the client, Ms. Moore. I may not always believe in the client, but I have to believe in the system. Through legal maneuvering, Kuzak and the respective lawyers for Pregerson’s two alleged accomplices get the case dismissed. Kuzak’s faith in the sometimes unjust justice system may have been damaged, but not destroyed. Eventually, Pregerson does answer for his crime.
The elder Pregerson cuts off the money line to his son, so Pregerson holds up Kuzak. McKenzie Brackman’s star litigator inquires of police friend Lester Tuttle (Felton Perry) whether Pregerson might have a carry permit for a certain gun. Pregerson receives a list of charges including resisting arrest and drug possession. With probation status concerning previous incidents now in jeopardy and 6-8 years minimum a high probability, Pregerson cuts a deal and admits to raping Moore with the others previously charged. He gets eighteen months.
To handle messy work like the Pregerson matter, Kuzak seeks a ‘body’ to relieve him of such obligations. Enter Victor Sifuentes (Jimmy Smits) of the Public Defender’s Office. Other McKenzie Brackman lawyers include Ann Kelsey (Jill Eikenberry) who balances the reality of income generation against servicing clients, giving the latter more weight on the justice scale.
In a staff meeting tete-a-tete with Managing Partner Douglas Brackman, Jr. (Alan Rachins), she sarcastically notes her acknowledgement of the firm’s capitalistic system. Kelsey considers her $52,800 salary disproportionate to the firm’s billing her time at $135 per hour at 1600 hours per year which, in turn, generates $216,000 for the firm’s coffers.
Kelsey and tax attorney Stuart Markowitz (Michael Tucker) become lovers in the pilot and marry during the course of the series. Tucker and Eikenberry were married in real life. Their daughter, Alison Tucker, joined the cast in the sixth season as Sarah, a young woman claiming to be Stuart’s illegitimate daughter.
Where Douglas Brackman, Jr. makes decisions on hiring and firing, oversees the day-to-day firm operations, and keeps McKenzie Brackman in good financial stead, Leland McKenzie (Richard Dysart) holds the role of Senior Partner. He provides an avuncular father figure for the firm. Markowitz is the heir apparent to Norm Chaney’s lucrative tax practice. Abby Perkins (Michele Greene) is a young, eager lawyer with an alcoholic, abusive husband (Boyd Gaines).
Like other Bochco shows, L.A. Law constantly pushed the boundaries of the network brass with situations, dialogue, and references. Also, like other Bochco shows, the writers used their creativity to evade the censors while maintaining script quality. As an example, the pilot episode contains a scene with Arnie and a private investigator where the latter explains photographs of Barry Graham (John McCook), the soon-to-be-ex-husband of Arnie’s client, Lydia Graham (Shannon Wilcox).
Barry and his honey [a mistress] poolside on the chaise lounge, in a sex act usually described by a two-digit number. Clever, provocative, and suggestive, the dialogue comes right up to the constantly moving judgment line separating what the network can and cannot broadcast.
In a subsequent scene, Arnie sums up his philosophy of practicing law in a settlement conference with the Grahams. We’re talking about grief, Mr. Graham. Yours. Your wife’s. Your children’s. We’re talking about fairness. Mainly, Mr. Graham, we’re talking about money.
George V. Higgins echoed this concept in Bochco’s Power of Attorney, his review of L.A. Law for the September 15, 1986 edition of The Wall Street Journal.
It’s about how people practice on each other, those who are lawyers, using law; and those who aren’t lawyers, using lawyers. It’s about deceit, duplicity, corruption and death, domination, manipulation, guile and lubricity. Vulgar, sordid greed abounds, along with all the other grimy stuff that makes life so interesting.
As a bonus for sharp-eyed viewers, a party scene in the pilot features the show’s co-creator and his wife, Steven Bochco and Barbara Bosson. In addition, Hill Street Blues alum James B. Sikking (‘Lt. Howard Hunter’) can also be seen. Bosson has appeared in several of Bochco’s shows -- Hooperman, Cop Rock, Hill Street Blues. L.A. Law was no exception. Bosson played McKenzie Brackman client Stacey Gill, a news anchor, in the first season episodes Slum Enchanted Evening and Raiders of the Lost Bark.
In the November 16, 1987 issue of Newsweek, the article Lust for Law by Harry F. Waters with Janet Huck details a telling lesson about the show’s influence, perhaps a dangerous one, on the legal profession.
During intermission at a Broadway play, Harry Hamlin was approached by a lawyer who praised the actor for his ‘brilliant summation’ in a trial scene involving malpractice. ‘I taped it,’ he went on, ‘and am going to use your arguments.’ It wasn’t until Hamlin sat through the second act that he remembered that Kuzak [Hamlin’s character] had, in fact, lost the case in question.
Further, L.A. Law enjoyed influence in legal education circles, stimulating law school applications to record rates, an impact not overlooked by the American Bar Association.
In the June 1989 edition of ABA Journal, Charles-Edward Anderson notes this item in an article entitled Lawyering Boom. Anderson states that admissions applications for the Fall 1987 semester reached an all-time high. He quotes Northwestern University Law School Dean Robert Bennett on the reason.
I think law schools owe a great debt to L.A. Law and other media productions that glamorize the legal profession. That and news reports of attorneys drawing record-breaking salaries are magnetizing students to law-school doors in overwhelming numbers.
Humor distinguished L.A. Law, quickly becoming a hallmark for the show in its formative phase. In the first season episode Simian Chanted Evening, Kuzak interrupts the civil wedding ceremony of Deputy District Attorney Grace Van Owen (Susan Dey) to declare his feelings for her -- in a gorilla suit! His ploy works as Grace leaves her bridegroom at the altar.
Eventually, though, Grace falls from Kuzak’s clutches into the arms of Victor Sifuentes, another rollercoaster relationship culminating in the sixth season finale Say Goodnight, Gracie. In this episode, Grace agrees to move to New York City with Victor.
Perhaps the L.A. Law writers were prescient in this instance. Both Dey and Smits went to shows based in New York City after their stint as L.A. lawyers. Dey starred as Wally Porter in the first season of CBS’ Love and War (1992-93) and Smits played Bobby Simone on ABC’s NYPD Blue for five seasons (1994-1999).
Kuzak got some court mileage out of the gorilla costume in the third season episode His Suit Is Hirsute. In the case of Hilbar vs. Bradley, Kuzak represents the plaintiff who seeks damages caused by faulty installation of a heating system that exploded. In fact, Kuzak’s client almost died. To lighten the atmosphere of the courtroom and, hopefully, any damage judgment, Kuzak’s opposing attorney, Frank Pastorini (Joe Malone), employs humor. Tap dancing, one-liners, and other forms of playfulness distract the jury from a serious case.
Kuzak has some good humor tricks of his own, though. He wears the gorilla suit while making his closing statement to the jury. Kuzak’s strategy consists of acknowledging Pastorini’s entertainment value instead of fighting it, thereby neutralizing its effect. Then, he brings the jury’s mental focus back to the case. As a result, he wins the case and a considerable judgment for his client.
In addition, sex provided a fertile area for humor. The Venus Butterfly, a first season episode, caused viewers to speculate about an erotic secret with unparalleled curiosity, fascination, and hope. In a polygamy case, Arnie and Stuart represent eight women who are married to Foster Troutman (Joe Mays), a fairly average-looking male of the species. Reluctantly, the women pursue legal action, but only at Arnie’s conscious prodding.
Troutman reveals his secret with women -- the Venus Butterfly sex maneuver -- to Stuart who utilizes the information proficiently to cement his relationship with Ann begun in the pilot episode. Unfortunately, the specifics lie in the viewer’s imagination as Troutman whispered his valuable knowledge.
Seinfeld also employed a sexual move as a story device in the episode The Fusilli Jerry. Jerry (Jerry Seinfeld) claims he has a fail-safe sexual maneuver (‘the move’). It proves to be a bona fide bone of contention between Jerry and his mechanic, David Puddy (Patrick Warburton). Apparently, Puddy uses the move on Elaine, his girlfriend and Jerry’s ex-girlfriend (Julia Louis-Dreyfus). The episode does not describe the move in detail, though it does reveal two clues. You need a headboard and less than one foot differential in height between the man and the woman.
A bit of sexual humor appearing in the second season episode Cannon of Ethics previously appeared in a Saturday Night Live sketch during the show’s classic years (1975-80) and may have its roots in vaudeville. In an indecent exposure case, the victim will not repeat the comments made by teh defendant, so the judge instructs her to write them on a piece of paper. Grace then passes the paper among the jury, however, one member dozed off. Mistaken identity occurs when Grace hands the evidence to the newly awakened and sleazy looking juror who thinks Grace authored the comments. He responds with a wink.
Larry Drake’s realistic, touching, and heartfelt portrayal of mentally retarded office worker Benny Stulwicz evolved from a guest appearance on the first season episode Becker on the Rox. In this episode, Abby defends Benny on a theft charge resulting from a ‘friend’ of Benny’s tricking him into an unlawful act. The judge declares Benny not guilty because his mental condition prevents him from forming an intent to steal.
In the standout second season episode Full Marital Jacket, Benny is arrested for rape. As tends to happen with cases at McKenzie Brackman, the firm’s lawyers differ on how to proceed. Admittedly, Arnie does not have a solid opinion of Benny’s innocence. In a dramatic scene, Arnie questions Benny himself about the events at issue and realizes that Benny is innocent in the truest sense of the word.
During the trial, the victim agrees to a voice identification test because the rapist made verbal demands during the attack. She cannot identify Benny as the rapist because his voice is slower than the one she heard during the attack.
In the second season episode The Wizard of Odds, black overachiever Jonathan Rollins (Blair Underwood) interviews with McKenzie Brackman, though the situation is reversed for all intents and purposes. Jonathan controls the interview from the outset, referencing powerful family friends, Ivy League accomplishments, and a salary offer of $71,000 from a competing firm. He reasons that a smaller, prestigious firm like McKenzie Brackman can be more responsive to his personal needs in the abstract.
However, his salary demand of $72,500 is quite definite and far beyond those of the firm’s first year associates. Despite Brackman’s warning, McKenzie sees star potential in Jonathan and meets the salary demand. His decision returns to haunt him. Two episodes later in Brackman Vasektimized, Jonathan reveals his salary to Abby who, in turn, reveals it to Victor. Disharmony abounds.
Victor challenges McKenzie (alone, to Abby’s dismay) and surmises sarcastically that a black from Harvard is worth more than a Chicano from Glendale. Victor easily comes up with his own salary demand -- $72,600. Kelsey discloses Victor’s raise to Abby along with some harsh reality -- she has to work harder for a raise.
If there was any doubt about Jonathan’s value, he dispelled it in the second season episode Open Heart Perjury. This episode showcases Richard Masur as Robert Bolland, an unscrupulous business manager. Stuart and Jonathan represent Katherine Crutcher (Irene Tedrow), a 74 year-old woman who claims that Bolland’s financial advice drained her life savings.
On the witness stand, Bolland makes a good show of sympathy, but Jonathan and Stuart learn that his remorse amounts to a figure similar to that of Mrs. Crutcher’s account -- zero. Stuart gives Jonathan the green light to play hardball and the young lawyer cross-examines Bolland with such intensity, focus, and ferocity that Bolland suffers a heart attack while testifying.
Further, Jonathan immediately motions to attach the proceeds, if any, of Bolland’s life insurance policy to the judgment. Ann and Abby later denigrate Jonathan’s modus operandi and he angrily leaves the office. Stuart, on the other hand, points out that Jonathan is a blue chip lawyer, a rookie who had the presence of mind to do what needed to be done in the best interest of the client, the essence of good lawyering.
Masur returned to L.A. Law in another guest appearance, a common practice as the show sometimes used actors for more than one role. In the eighth season episode The Green, Green Grass of Home, Masur played Barry Glassman, a fugitive whose real name is Jay Ellison and who aided in the prison escape of Black Panther Horace Washington.
Conchata Ferrell appeared regularly as entertainment superlawyer Susan Bloom in the sixth season after making a guest appearance in the second season episode Hand Roll Express as a food critic who takes revenge on her ex-boyfriend by publishing a bad review of his restaurant. The review prompts the ex to file a lawsuit against the magazine in which the review appeared.
Ferrell played the brash, blunt, and sometimes bullying showbiz mouthpiece with her usual aplomb. In the episode All About Arnie, she represents Arnie who is by this time a television personality thanks to a divorce home video informercial and appearances on a local news program. Susan sets Arnie up as a network news on-air consultant. Arnie later realizes that Susan set him up in the middle of a power struggle between the show’s co-host and producer, Brooks Tapman and Ken Feldman, respectively.
When Tapman fires Feldman and Arnie, the latter’s anger immediately surfaces and he confronts Bloom. With nonchalance, she explains the realities of the situation in terms he can appreciate -- the network bought out his contract amounting to $250,000 for two weeks work and an offer of 15% above his old fee could be forthcoming from his former local station.
In Teleliteracy Is Here...So Telefriend, Chapter 14 of his 1992 book Teleliteracy, noted television critic David Bianculli raises the issue of television programming as literature.
Authors of written literature reveal their own enthusiasms and backgrounds when quoting from -- or alluding to -- previous written works. Why should TV’s viewers or its writers behave any differently? When writing, or ‘reading,’ the visual and verbal language of television, why aren’t we given credit for processing the often amazingly arcane and complex information and allusions TV throws at us constantly?
L.A. Law presents a perfect case study for Bianculli’s question, relying in several instances on the audience’s knowledge and appreciation of television. For example, Book of Renovation, Chapter One, the eighth season premiere, introduced Alan Rosenberg and Debi Mazar as attorney Eli Levinson and secretary Denise Iannello respectively. Viewers were already familiar with these characters from the canceled ABC show Civil Wars. The crossover was the first time characters from a canceled show transferred to a competing network show on a regular basis. To solidify the connection to L.A. Law, the writers dictated that Stuart and Eli were cousins.
William M. Finkelstein, an L.A. Law behind-the-scenes alumnus, created Civil Wars for Steven Bochco Productions. It aired from November 20, 1991 to March 2, 1993 and for two weeks in August 1993.
L.A. Lawless, the seventh season premiere, revolves around April 29, 1992, the date of the Los Angeles riots. In a scene lifted from real-life television news, Stuart Markowitz suffers an attack similar to the one Reginald Denny endured where thugs forcibly removed him from a truck and beat him senseless. Stuart’s mental state deteriorates because of the incident.
On a lighter note, Arnie represents Mr. Champion (Dan Castellanata) in a wrongful termination suit against his employer, a theme park. Mr. Champion portrayed a larger-than-life version of Homer Simpson from The Simpsons at the theme park until he removed his character head in a customer’s line of sight. In the quaint suburbopolis of Springfield, Castellanata supplies Homer Simpson’s voice. A neat nod to keeping the character’s voice uniform in all portrayals. Although The Simpsons is a 20th Century Fox production on the FOX network, L.A. Law is also a 20th Century Fox production. The character crossover keeps things square and tidy within the corporate family.
In the episode, Arnie makes a pitch for more entertainment law work at the firm, an idea he originally raised in Simian Chanted Evening.
Also, A Martinez joined the cast in this episode as attorney Daniel Morales. When Stuart asks Daniel where he practiced before, Morales simply responds, Santa Barbara, a reference to his starring role on the soap opera of the same name airing on NBC from July 30, 1984 to January 15, 1993.
Martinez also appeared in the fourth season episode The Last Gasp as Victor’s childhood friend, Hector Rodriguez, a drug addict and death row inmate. Victor represents Hector in Federal Court, but new drug research and oratory skills come to no avail. No stay from the governor, either. At Hector’s request, Victor is present at the execution.
For football fans, this episode is also noteworthy for then Chicago Bears Head Coach Mike Ditka playing himself in a story line in which Bears fan Jack Lewis (John Kapelos) sues the football team for misrepresentation and false advertising because it’s 6-10 record did not match the pre-season promotion or the team’s talent. Lewis sues for expenses incurred for purchasing a satellite dish to watch the games, emotional distress, and a blood pressure condition. He settles for the opportunity to explain his story to Ditka.
Of all guest characters or recurring characters, perhaps none stand out more than direct mail king David Meyer (Dann Florek). Once Roxanne’s husband, David Meyer is the firm’s court-appointed receiver in the fifth season episode Speak, Lawyers, For Me. Office politics, financial conflicts, and professional pressures have reduced McKenzie Brackman to a mere shadow of its former self. In the opening, Meyer gives a pep talk to the firm and closes with the line familiar to fans of Bochco’s Hill Street Blues -- Let’s be careful out there.
Arnie represented Roxanne in her divorce, a sticky situation as he also partnered with Dave in the aforementioned home video deal. Although Arnie sometimes exhibits little in the way of scruples or character, he alludes to those voids as occupational hazards in a divorce settlement meeting. In the third season episode Urine Trouble Now, Arnie refers to an opposing attorney as a bloodhound, but quickly points out to his adversary that he means the term as a professional compliment. David Meyer also appears briefly in the fourth season episode One Rat -- One Ranger. He seems to find true love by happenstance, bumping into Stuart and his opposition’s client, a disgruntled dating service user. Unlike Roxanne, she is genuinely interested in the wonderful world of direct mail.
L.A. Law’s fourth season reflected the financial reality confronting law firms. One Rat -- One Ranger offers the situation of hiring a rainmaker partner to help keep the firm solvent. Rosalind Shays (Diana Muldaur) steps up to the plate as the firm’s moneymaker.
Rosalind plays hardball and eventually wins the Senior Partner position when Leland decides to step down in Blood, Sweat and Fears. While the clients like Rosalind’s work, the partners don’t like Rosalind. Leland seeks his old position. Rosalind resigns in Forvige Me Father, For I Have Sued, but the strenuous relationship continues in the following season. Rosalind brings a sexual harassment suit against the firm. In the fifth season episode Lie Harder, Rosalind settles for $1.4 million, a lower figure than the judgment.
Somewhere along the way, Leland and Rosalind become partners of a different kind, a relationship that may consist of mutual respect, friendship, and physical attraction, but not love. In one of television’s most bizarre, jarring, and abrupt deaths, Rosalind falls down an empty elevator shaft while waiting for the elevator with Leland in Good to the Last Drop. The elevator doors open, Rosalind backs into the opening without looking, and she plunges to her death while Leland gets the shock of his life.
TV Guide placed Good to the Last Drop at #91 in its 1997 issue denoting the 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time.
In Yale Law Journal Volume 98 (1989), noted legal ethics scholar Stephen Gillers explains the necessity of ambiguity to the legal system and its portrayal on L.A. Law.
[An attorney] has to reconcile the dissonance between his responsibility to achieve the client’s goal and his personal doubts about the wisdom of that goal. The creative challenge to L.A. Law is how to have a result for cases raising hard issues without pretending to have the solution to the dilemmas they pose. The world of popular entertainment and the world of law each requires a result. A story must have an ending of sorts; a court proceeding must have a judgment. Yet due regard for the ambiguity and complexity of issues like these makes it imperative that the show not pretend to have solved them in less than an hour.
Indeed, L.A. Law succeeded in portraying both sides of extremely complex issues. For example, the title of the fourth season episode Noah’s Bark refers to Tourette’s Syndrome, a condition of Jonathan’s client, Noah Cowan (Lenny Wolpe). Despite Noah’s superior ability, experience, and expertise, his market research employer fired him because Tourette’s Syndrome forces him to uncontrollably utter unwanted language, thereby disrupting the workplace.
While one can empathize with Noah, the employer argues that no matter the extent of Noah’s professional contribution, his behavior disturbs the work setting to a highly significant, deeply realized, and greatly unproductive degree.
Jonathan wins the case and a substantial amount for Noah -- $100,000 plus $150,000 in back pay. However, Noah accepts an alternative offer to settle -- $50,000, a new car, and a promotion. With one catch, though. Noah works out of his home. In this instance, the client simply wanted his job back and a chance to use his abilities along the lines of excellence. Money was not an issue.
True Brit, a fourth season episode, addresses the issue of attorney-client privilege. Jonathan’s girlfriend and co-worker Diana Moses (Renee Jones) finds herself legally obligated to her friend Manny Jackson (Jeff Kizer) after Manny tells her he hit a boy on a bike with his car and left the scene without reporting the incident. At present, the boy is dead, lying in a ditch, and the parents are unaware of his location.
Attorney-client privilege of confidentiality applies. Diana and the other attorneys cannot disclose the location of the body, an extremely upsetting, incredible, and gut-wrenching concept to the boy’s parents who have reported him missing. They just want the simple dignity of burying their son.
By nature, a lawyer’s job is adversarial and conflicts, as they say, come with the territory. L.A. Law differed from other law-oriented programs in displaying conflicts beyond those of a caseload, showing the personal battles lawyers face internally, within themselves and among their colleagues, office mates, partners, rivals, and clients.
In the same issue of Yale Law Journal, the show’s legal adviser responded to Gillers’ article, contributing an insider’s account. Charles B. Rosenberg wrote An L.A. Lawyer Replies. Rosenberg explains the show’s depiction of the legal profession.
Critics could say that McKenzie Brackman is an odd firm. It is partner heavy, its economics are murky, and the mix of practice specialties is at best eclectic. On the other hand, it portrays much about law firms that is pristinely true: lawyers often feel overworked, they often like each other but nonetheless feel a certain rivalry within the firm, money is an important status symbol, and some lawyers are not-so-nice. L.A. Law has also made the ethics of lawyers a subject of some angst for the show’s characters. While lawyers have been shown in the past as sleazy or unethical, it is rare for a television show or movie to explore the ethical situation as L.A. Law often does. While the ethics of the show’s lawyers is not perfect, it is at least examined.
In the long run, the show’s greatest impact may well be on the public’s perception of the lawyer-characters as people with real emotions and sometimes difficult lives -- people who do not always know the right path, people who do not always love their clients or their colleagues, people who sometimes lose...Thus, if L.A. Law merely serves to sensitize the general public to the fact that lawyers are real people with real emotions, it will have served an important role for the profession.
Court is adjourned.