American Gigolo starts from two very marked references. On the one hand, the series is based on the film of the same title by Paul Schrader, the one that made Richard Gere a superstar. On the other hand, the conversion of the iconic 1980 film into a 2022 series is in the hands of David Hollander, creator and showrunner of Ray Donovan. There's a lot of this series in American Gigolo. His Los Angeles is the same bright but unforgiving city and its protagonist is a hustler similar to the one played by Liev Schreiber.
The choice of Hollander as captain of such a project makes perfect sense. American Gigolo, the series, is a concoction of things, but the recipe is well calibrated and the drink tastes rich. It is a bit sad that it arrives in Spain invisible within the colorful initial catalog of SkyShowtime, although how to highlight Yellowstone in the meantime.
Another inevitable thing is to wonder if this series is possible without someone like Richard Gere. The original American Gigolo and Gere have a perfect symbiosis: he brings to the film his unrepeatable charisma and it returns the favor by making film history. American Gigolo, the movie, is not an outstanding title but a legendary one. You can't understand the cinema of the 80s without it.
American Gigolo, the series, will not go down in the pop history of television and, nevertheless, it is difficult to put it down. Like Julian Kaye, the prostitute of the title, Jon Bernthal is more than fine. It's not Richard Gere but who is. Gretchen Mol is not Lauren Hutton either, but same question. David Hollander's series knows this and turns to its predecessor with tremendous cunning and great care. He knows it's something else. It needs to be something else.
His Julian Kaye is released from prison after 15 years of sentence for a crime that, oh surprise, he has not committed. This unfair paperwork has scarred Kaye, who is forced to reintegrate into the real world without the clean slate that a long stay in prison theoretically facilitates. As he did in Ray Donovan, David Hollander bets on hopelessness and pessimism.
For him, the city only degrades, people only change for the worse and three decades behind bars do not help when it comes to recovering your job as a paid lover. Everything is getting worse.
As much as the series' credits use the film's vitamin Call Me de Blondie again, times have changed. We hear Debbie Harry lasciviously singing that "call me" and we see the new Julian Kaye in his convertible, choosing suits and contenting ladies.
However, the eroticism and suspense of the new series will soon show us that they are not those of then. American Gigolo is a sequel to which one approaches with the knife in the teeth, expecting an absurd nostalgic slapstick or an impossible reinterpretation. And it is reinterpretation and nostalgia, but not one of those that take the viewer to a foolishly idealized past. American Gigolo is something else.
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