In Hulu’s limited series “Under the Bridge”, Riley Keough portrays Rebecca Godfrey, a novelist who undertakes the task of writing a non-fiction book about the murder of Reena Virk, a 14-year-old girl from the same Canadian suburb where Rebecca grew up. In one episode, Rebecca’s father questions her focus on one of the accused killers, teen Warren Glowatski, rather than on Warren’s alleged victim, prompting deep reflection from Rebecca.
She muses, “Because I’m challenging the reader to see that the worst thing he did isn’t who he is. People can do horrible things, and that doesn’t make them inherently evil. And I don’t know what the alternative is, other than me writing a sad story about a girl I didn’t know.”
Rebecca Godfrey, portrayed here by Riley Keough, indeed corresponds to a real individual, with actual counterparts in Reena Virk (played by Vritika Gupta) and Warren Glowatski (portrayed by Javon Walton). Godfrey’s 2005 book, also titled Under the Bridge, earned acclaim for its insightful portrayal of the children who bullied and ultimately murdered Reena by a gorge in 1997, as well as for the nuanced depiction of Reena herself.
The eight-episode TV adaptation by Quinn Shephard ambitiously covers the entire narrative, shifting viewpoints from Reena, to the troubled foster child Josephine Bell (Chloe Guidry) and her affluent friend Kelly (Izzy G.), to Warren; Reena’s parents Suman (Archie Panjabi) and Manjit (Ezra Farouke); local police officer Cam Bentland (Lily Gladstone); and ultimately, Rebecca herself. However, in its effort to portray the story through everyone’s eyes, the adaptation struggles to achieve the depth that Godfrey’s original work was lauded for.
A critical issue is the scripted character of Rebecca, as portrayed by Keough, and her relationship with Cam, a composite character not present in the actual case, which receives substantial narrative emphasis, possibly overshadowing the connection she develops with Warren during her research for the book.
This focus shift towards the storyteller rather than their subjects risks undermining the story itself, similar to what occurred with Netflix’s “Inventing Anna”, where the emphasis seemed less on the con artist Anna Delvey and more on the journalist who chronicled her. The result was a less comprehensible Delvey, making it hard to grasp why she captivated both the reporter and the audience.
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