Like many of the series on the USA Network, In Plain Sight goes beyond its description.
On paper, In Plain Sight is about the U.S. Marshal’s highly secretive branch of the witness protection program (WITSEC) which relocates federal witnesses.
But the show goes much deeper as it revolves around Mary Shannon, the complicated, grumpy Marshal with a dysfunctional family, and her stoic partner, Marshall Mann. Their personal lives, especially Mary’s, are as important as the back stories of those who end up in WITSEC -- career criminals, whistle-blowers or innocents who witnessed a crime.
Humor mixed in with the drama complements In Plain Sight’s plots.
In Plain Sight begins its fourth season at 10 p.m. tonight, May 1, on the USA Network.
Recently, Mystery Scene interviewed Mary McCormack, who plays Mary Shannon, and Frederick Weller who plays Marshall Mann. Each has a long string of solid performances in TV series and the movies. McCormack and Weller also have successful stage careers. McCormack received a 2008 Tony nomination for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Play.for her role in Boeing-Boeing. Five of the six Broadway productions in which Weller has appeared have won or been nominated for Tony Awards, and seven of his nine Off-Broadway shows have received nominations at the Obie, Drama Desk or Lucille Lortel Awards.
During the interview, both McCormack and Weller cracked jokes and laughed, mentioned their presence on Twitter and seemed to really enjoy each other’s company.
The theme of In Plain Sight’s new season is change and the characters will undergo tremendous changes. One of the most intriguing developments – and I am not giving away any spoilers here -- will be Mary McCormack’s real-life pregnancy will mean that Mary Shannon also will be pregnant.
“Mary Shannon's not necessarily maternal so it's making for some interesting stories and character development, which I think is really fun to play,” said McCormack. “And to me, it's really interesting to see someone play pregnant who is pregnant. It's not altogether as pretty as when someone all chiseled up does it.
“As a woman, I find it refreshing to see someone who's dealing with it, someone who's passionate about their career and then having to try to come to terms with this new area in her life, which all women deal with.
“The pregnancy actually provides for really an interesting development in season four.”
And this will add another layer of change for the series.
“If the theme of the season is change, it sort of falls right into that. You know, Mary's whole life is changing. Her mom is sober, her sister's engaged and getting married and Marshall is in this relationship, which seems to be working and is sort of meaningful. And then what's she left with?
“And all of a sudden she has this enormous change in her own life too. So I think it's going to actually be really rich for stories.”
Mary Shannon, as viewers know, isn’t a fan of change.
“She hates change,” said McCormack. “And she’s sort of confused.
“She keeps expecting things to fall apart. Like in the first episode you see her expecting her sister to fall right into old patterns and it turns out she really hasn't. Her whole life has been spent taking care of other people, and now those other people randomly either get sober or learn how to take care of themselves. I think her identity's in question.
“A big part of her is sort of walking around feeling sort of smug and proud of herself for being the only adult in the room and now she's not the only adult in the room. It's a big shift for her.
“And now on top of it she's becoming the one thing she never wanted to be, which is a mother.
“And these poor writers, I only told them I was pregnant a few episodes in, so they're scrambling. But it should be exciting.”
And how is Marshall going to deal with the pregnancy?
“I think Marshall has a pregnancy fetish, but they haven't written that in yet, that I know of,” said Weller, with a laugh.
Even if there wasn’t a pregnancy, McCormack says would continue to explore new aspects of Mary Shannon.
“I just love the character. David Maples, who created the show, just wrote a really great part. Fred's part is great too, and so is Paul Ben-Victor's. Maples really wrote some three-dimensional characters. I love them,” said McCormack.
“I love that Mary Shannon's really good at her job and not so good at her personal life. I like that she's cynical and sarcastic. It's just fun to play someone so grouchy. It's sort of refreshing. I can be a little bit grouchy myself so it's a comfortable fit.”
As Mary deals with her pregnancy, Marshall contends with a relationship with a sexy cop, which has the potential to change the dynamic between Marshall and Mary.
“Marshall's feelings for Mary are now inevitably more submerged. They're more submerged, like underground lava or tunneling Viet Kong. They are more dangerous,” said Weller.
(Part II of the interview with McCormack and Weller will continue May 2)
Photo: Frederick Weller and Mary McCormack. USA photo
This is one of the award weeks for mystery fiction. The Edgars were announced Thursday, April 28. (See my previous post.)
The winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in the mystery/thriller category is Tom Franklin's Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter. That was announced Friday, April 29.
And the Agatha Awards were announced Saturday, April 30, during the Malice Domestic conference.
The Agatha winners are:
Best Novel - Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny. This was Penny's fourth Agatha in a row.
Best Nonfiction - Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks by John Curran
Best Children's/Young Adult - The Other Side of Dark by Sarah Smith
Best First Mystery Novel - The Long Quiche Goodbye by Avery Aames
Best Short Story - "So Much in Common" by Mary Jane Maffini, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine - Sept./Oct. 2010
Mystery Scene congratulations all the winners
This is a big week for mystery fiction lovers.
The Edgar Symposium begins Wednesday, April 27, at the Lighthouse International in New York City. Many top-notch authors and publishers will be there discussing the genre and its future. I'll be conducting the interview with Grand Master Sara Paretsky.
The 65th annual Edgar Awards banquet will be Thursday, April 28, at the Grand Hyatt in New York City. All the nominees are worthy.
And on Friday, April 29, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize will be awarded. I am delighted to say I was one of the judges for the mystery-thriller category.
Again, all the nominees are worthy.
And this also is the week that Malice Domestic begins on Friday, April 29, through May 1 at the Hyatt Regency in Bethesda, MD. This year, Sue Grafton will receive the Lifetime Achievement; Donna Andrews, at left, is the Toastmaster and Carole Nelson Douglas is the Guest of Honor.
This is the 23rd year for Malice, which celebrates the traditional mystery.
And I'd like to celebrate the traditional mystery.
In general, I believe that mystery fiction mirrors our society. These are novels that refect who we are, the struggles we have and how we deal with crime and punishment.
The traditional mystery especially does this. These novels often are about relationships and family issues. The best evidence of this are the nominees for the Agatha Awards. (Again, all the nominees are worthy.)
Take a look at those up for Best Novel: Stork Raving Mad by Donna Andrews (Minotaur); Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny (Minotaur); The Scent of Rain and Lightning by Nancy Pickard (Ballantine); Drive Time by Hank Phillippi Ryan (Mira); Truly, Madly by Heather Webber (St. Martin's Paperbacks).
And also take a look at those who got the nod for Best First Novel: The Long Quiche Goodbye by Avery Aames (Berkley); Murder at the PTA by Laura Alden (Obsidian); Maid of Murder by Amanda Flower (Five Star/Gale); Full Mortality by Sasscer Hill (Wildside Press); Diamonds for the Dead by Alan Orloff (Midnight Ink).
Louise Penny's Bury Your Dead revolves around Quebec's tangled history, friendships and debilitating grief.
In Nancy Pickard's The Scent of Rain and Lightning, a decades-old murder forces a community to deal with consequences.
A subplot of Alan Orloff's Diamonds for the Dead concerns his main character's feelings about his Jewish background and grief over his father's death and the time they wasted being mad at each other.
Each of these deals with how we live our lives.
The amateur sleuth subgenre has given us a view into a host of occupations such as cooks, bookstore owners, minimum wage employees and innkeepers. These novels give us a glimpse into worlds many of us will never know about. While these novels often are light, precise plotting, appealing characters and crisp dialogue keep them from being lightweight.
So here's a toast to the traditional mystery and fond wishes for a wonderful Malice Domestic.
Mystery Writers of America announced the winners of the 2011 Edgar Allan Poe Awards, honoring the best in mystery fiction, non-fiction and television published or produced in 2010, during the 65th Gala Banquet, April 28, 2011 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, New York City.
BEST NOVEL
The Lock Artist by Steve Hamilton (Minotaur Books)
BEST FIRST NOVEL BY AN AMERICAN AUTHOR
Rogue Island by Bruce DeSilva (Tom Doherty Associates – Forge Books)
BEST PAPERBACK ORIGINAL
Long Time Coming by Robert Goddard (Random House - Bantam)
BEST FACT CRIME
Scoreboard, Baby: A Story of College Football, Crime and Complicity
by Ken Armstrong and Nick Perry (University of Nebraska Press – Bison Original)
BEST CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL
Charlie Chan: The Untold Story of the Honorable Detective and his
Rendezvouz with American History by Yunte Huang (W.W. Norton)
BEST SHORT STORY
"The Scent of Lilacs" – Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine by Doug Allyn (Dell Magazines)
BEST JUVENILE
The Buddy Files: The Case of the Lost Boy by Dori Hillestad Butler (Albert Whitman & Co.)
BEST YOUNG ADULT
Interrogation of Gabriel James by Charlie Price (Farrar, Straus, Giroux Books for Young Readers)
BEST PLAY
The Psychic by Sam Bobrick (Falcon Theatre – Burbank, CA)
BEST TELEVISION EPISODE TELEPLAY
“Episode 1” - Luther, Teleplay by Neil Cross (BBC America)
ROBERT L. FISH MEMORIAL AWARD
"Skyler Hobbs and the Rabbit Man" – Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine
by Evan Lewis (Dell Magazines)
GRAND MASTER
Sara Paretsky
RAVEN AWARDS
Centuries & Sleuths Bookstore, Forest Park, Illinois
Once Upon A Crime Bookstore, Minneapolis, Minnesota
THE SIMON & SCHUSTER - MARY HIGGINS CLARK AWARD
(Presented at MWA’s Agents & Editors Party on Wednesday, April 27, 2011)
The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Marcia Clark’s role as the lead prosecutor in the infamous 1995 O.J. Simpson trial put her in the public eye. Since her resignation in 1997 as a prosecutor for the State of California, Clark has worked as an Entertainment Tonight correspondent and, with co-author Teresa Carpeter, wrote Without a Doubt, a nonfiction book based on the O.J. case.
Clark now makes her fiction debut with Guilt by Association (Mulholland Books/Little, Brown), a legal thriller whose heroine is Rachel Knight, an assistant district attorney in L.A.’s elite Special Trials unit.
Mystery Scene caught up with Clark for a Q&A before she launched her book tour for Guilt by Association, which has been earning positive reviews.
Q: What inspired you to write Guilt by Association.
A: I’d loved writing since I was a kid, but it never occurred to me to write full time until I finished co-writing Without a Doubt. At that point, I was excited about the prospect of writing a thriller, but a little – well, let’s face it – a lot daunted by the prospect of writing a book. Then fate, in the form of writing scripts for a legal drama on television, stepped in. The experience of script writing gave me enough confidence to get the ball rolling, and so I began novel writing.
After trying a few different perspectives and styles, I realized that what I really wanted to do was revisit my happiest years as a prosecutor, effectively combining my two greatest loves: prosecuting and fiction writing.
I was big fan of “Tales of the City” by Armistead Maupin, who created a beautiful world filled with fun, quirky and interesting characters. And that’s what I wanted to do: create a world that would be an ongoing series with recurring characters who’d – hopefully – also be fun, loveable and interesting. And I wanted to create a world that would convey the excitement and satisfaction, as well as the camaraderie and fun, of being a prosecutor.
Q: What was your inspiration for heroine Rachel Knight.
A: Rachel is a composite of many different women I’ve known, which means, of course, that I’m in there somewhere, too. But I think of Rachel as being my “avatar”: smarter, stronger, faster, etc. My real contribution to Rachel is my flaws: obsessive, headstrong, impatient, sometimes impulsive, and always smart-ass-y.
Q: Have you been a lifelong mystery fan? Any favorites?
A: I have definitely been a lifelong mystery fan, and I have so many favorites, I don’t like to name favorites because I invariably forget to mention someone I love. But I will specifically mention one, because he’s passed and I want to add my voice to the many who keep his name alive: Robert B. Parker. He was a huge inspiration to many, many readers and writers, not just me.
Q: You show a different view of L.A. in Guilt by Association. Do you love Los Angeles?
A: I suppose I do love L.A, though I sometimes forget because I get distracted by the obnoxious traffic and smog. There’s no city like L.A. When you fly over other cities, you see tightly wound concentric circles of lights; a localized hub surrounded by suburban quiet. But when you fly over L.A., the lights of all the various cities go on and on for miles. The spread of urban-style living is huge and wide.
As a result, L.A. is actually an umbrella that covers many different cities, each with its own unique character. This naturally provides a lot of grist for the mill and a great palette of colors to choose from in writing a book.
Q: Will the O.J. trial always be a part of your profile?
A: Of course. That trial was a significant moment in history, and it was broadcast across the country, day in and day out, for a year and a half – you couldn’t escape the coverage even if you wanted to. As a result, I think everyone involved will forever be associated with it.
Q: I love the way you show Rachel’s friendship with the other women. Too often women are at odds in novels and movies. Are LAPD Detective Bailey Keller and prosecutor Toni LaCollette based on your own friends?
A: Yes, they are – I’m happy, and very lucky, to be able to say. I, too, am weary of seeing women portrayed as being at each other’s throats. It’s a clichéd notion that whenever there’s more than one woman in the room, they have to be in competition with one another.
The truth is, women generally understand each other in ways men simply can’t, and that allows them to share a unique closeness. In this series, I want to show the truth about how important women are to each other and how they go the extra mile and beyond for their friends.
Q: What next?
A: Writing novels – I hope! The second in the series comes out a year from now.
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