Elsbeth Recap: He’ll Be Watching You
More unexpected little dance numbers, please!
The two most important takeaways for viewers of “Something Blue” are that perfectionism probably isn’t worth it and more episodes of all sorts of TV series should incorporate dance numbers. The dancing doesn’t even have to be particularly good (see above, re: the dubious value of perfectionism); sheer enthusiasm alone will be enough, especially if the actors commit to the silliness of the bit while making sure their characters are dancing in earnest. It helps if the actors in question are working at the level set by Carrie Preston and Keegan-Michael Key as the queen of kindly implacability, Elsbeth Tascioni, and this episode’s multi-talented but ultimately hapless murderer of the week, Ashton Hayes.
Let’s not pity Ashton too much, though. Before planning and carrying out the murder of his formerly valued employee/brand-new son-in-law Derek at his own wedding reception, Ashton has proven himself to be an insufferably exacting perfectionist. We’ve seen him issue cutting, judgy verdicts on everything from the sample menu for the reception (tepid bouillabaisse! Over-blanched langoustines!) to the dance number his darling Nora and Derek have planned for their special day. Everything needs to be just so, and nothing is, and that’s very irritating to Ashton, but at least his wife, Poppy, is able to bring him around to give Nora the wedding day that will be meaningful and joyful to her. That includes a very goofy bride-and-groom dance number choreographed by someone named Flash Rob (get it? Like a Flash Mob? He’s very cool!). Ashton is — not incorrectly — aghast at its tackiness and poor execution, but Nora is his pride and joy, and he can deny her nothing. What’s all this wealth for, if not to make Nora’s dreams come true?
Speaking of the Hayes family wealth, Ashton uses it to further signal his embrace of Derek, who is a very promising and rule-following accountant at Ashton’s boutique wealth asset management firm. Not only does Ashton introduce Derek to Nora, but he’s ready to confide in Derek the truth about how he’s acquired the financial resources to live a squeaky clean-looking life of luxury. The emphasis there should be on squeaky clean-looking because the Hayes family riches are, in fact, quite filthy, having been acquired over decades of working for some very high-wealth bad guys. The firm has a sterling reputation thanks to word-of-mouth among their law-abiding clients. It is a roaring financial success thanks to its second, secret group of powerful clients, who pay handsomely for “the appearance of respectability and legitimacy” furnished by Ashton & Co.’s discreet expertise in tax evasion and savvy, profitable laundering of those clients’ ill-gotten gains.
Derek immediately repays Ashton’s choice to confide in him about the extent and source of the family’s wealth, and to bestow upon him a coveted vintage heirloom watch, by forgetting entirely the meaning of the word discretion. We smash-cut to Derek’s bachelor party, where the groom is blind drunk, hurling cash hither and yon, and crowing to everyone within earshot about how rich he is now. The dancer who is assigned to Derek for a private dance, Capri, immediately delivers a detailed and comprehensive report about Derek’s behavior, leading Ashton and Poppy to move to Plan B. No, not sending Derek on his way with a big payoff and an iron-clad NDA — the only solution is murder! Obviously!
It’s too late to call off the wedding; that would devastate Nora, who is the last in her friend group to marry and very insecure about it. No, it’s far better for Nora to go forward with and enjoy her perfect wedding. Her parents can then help her recover from the loss of her husband rather than the mortification of a canceled wedding. The Hayes family is going to have a perfect wedding, no matter what, at least until the groom dies from a tragic, apparent drunk golf-cart drowning incident during the reception.
Officer Kaya and Elsbeth are immediately on the case. They’re once again working with Detective Donnelly (Molly Price) from episode three, “Reality Shock.” Arriving at the country club where the reception and murder have both taken place the night of the unfortunate events, they get right down to business. Elsbeth’s amusing and oddly revealing asides in this episode include observations such as “My wedding was nothing like this; there were way more pleated pants and mosquitoes.” Over the course of her scenes, perhaps in solidarity with Elsbeth, Detective Donnelly also shares some deeply odd recollections from her own previous marriage.
As their investigation continues, they discover a mystery within the mystery: Derek appears to have drowned, having gotten wasted on too many celebratory beers, and met his end in a pond on the golf course. However, the medical examiner’s findings include the confounding detail that Derek did not drown. There’s no water in his lungs at all, indicating that he suffocated before he even went in the water, but there’s also no physical evidence of what could have caused the suffocation. A further complication is provided by the grieving Nora, who points out that it’s very weird for beer to have played a role in Derek’s inebriation, as he didn’t even like beer. He only ever drank it when offered by Ashton, in order to be polite to his boss.
During an investigative tour of the country club’s kitchen, the catering manager — who you may recall was on the receiving end of Ashton’s scathing remarks about the proposed entrée for Nora and Derek’s reception at the top of the episode — offhandedly reveals the easy availability of quick-dissolving tape. The kitchen staff use it to label ingredients and dishes without having to worry about removing it from containers and trays, because it literally disappears in the wash, dissolving after 30 seconds of contact with water. I like the bridge between the use of the tape in the cold open and the investigation. I’d been genuinely confused about how Ashton hoped to stage a drowning by taping Derek’s mouth shut, and now I know about a very handy kitchen tool (non-murder weapon category).
Although the Hayes family elected not to hire a videographer for the wedding, citing Ashton’s clients’ privacy, Elsbeth and Kaya find an abundance of casual footage shared online by searching the wedding-specific hashtag for Derek and Nora’s special day. The two key findings are lots of nefarious faces Elsbeth recognizes from her days in Chicago, and footage of Derek and Nora’s special dance number, which included Flash Rob’s signature choreo move, Derek tapping on his wrist, which is clearly adorned with a very nice-looking watch. Where’s that watch now? It wasn’t on his corpse. Curiouser and curiouser.
Elsbeth learns of the watch-tapping pantomime move from Flash Rob himself when she goes for a dance lesson with him to prepare for her forthcoming housewarming party. It’s an unofficial visit, with a stated reason that a DJ will be there, and she wants to be ready for dancing to break out at any moment, but while she’s at his studio, the playboy dancer reveals that he and Nora were having an affair. Perhaps Derek took his own life because he was jealous?
Elsbeth continues to worry at the issue of the watch, eventually convincing Captain Wagner — who knows the Hayes family through their contributions to the foundation Wagner and his wife run — to call Ashton with a phony update, assuring him that they’ll be dredging the pond the very next day in pursuit of the watch to solve this case. If it turns up, they’ll know Derek met with an unfortunate accident, and if not, they’ll know they need to keep searching. Ashton makes a last-minute decision to plant the watch at Flash Rob’s studio to steer the police’s attention back towards him. However, Elsbeth expertly flushes both him and the watch out through the irresistible allure of a friendly dance-off that culminates in a cartwheel and the watch falling out of Ashton’s pocket. His enthusiasm at the opportunity to relive some of his salad days as a cheerleader at Yale overcame his better judgment and led to his downfall.
But not before Carrie Preston and Keegan-Michael Key live it all the way up by re-enacting some of Catherine Zeta-Jones and Renée Zellweger’s moves from the “Hot Honey Rag” in — what else? — Chicago (Elsbeth loves a theme). This bit lasts less than a minute and I’d watch at least three. Preston and Key’s chemistry is zippy, and their zest for the very silly choreography is at Meyer lemon levels. More unexpected little dance numbers, please! Once the watch falls from Ashton’s pocket, the NYPD immediately claps on the handcuffs; that’s one more homicide cleared.
Finally, it’s time for Elsbeth’s housewarming party, and the place is buzzing with many of the people she’s met and charmed since arriving in New York. Turns out, being an earnestly friendly oddball is not really a turn-off to New Yorkers (something anyone who’s ever read Metropolitan Diary could tell us)! Everyone’s chatting and having a lovely time, Kaya arrives in a beautiful sequined shift dress, and even Captain Wagner appears with a can of beluga caviar from Claudia as a housewarming gift. His real purpose, though, is to come clean to Elsbeth and join her and Kaya’s efforts to get the real bad guys. At this point, either Wagner is the magnificently crafty puppetmaster of a very lucrative money laundering scheme, or Lieutenant Noonan is leading him down the garden path (possibly, and I hate to say this, with Claudia’s assistance). There’s only one way to find out: by tuning in next week!
Just One More Thing
• I would love to know more about the note-taking process that Capri, the observant exotic dancer uses; there’s no room for so much as a post-it note or golf pencil in her costumes, so does she use Sherlock Holmes’s memory palace technique? Perhaps mnemonic devices of her own creation? Regardless, I think this could be a very lucrative side hustle for her.
• There are too many costuming MVP (most valuable pieces) options to pick just one this week. From the unironically beautiful (Nora’s ice blue-and-white wedding gown and Kaya’s party dress) to the outrageously exuberant (Elsbeth’s housewarming party jumpsuit, a riot of pink and orange brocade, lamé, rhinestones, and marabou), there are no wrong choices.