Truth
Ongoing Series | Crime, Drama
Quick Hitter
Jill Ryan is not like other attorneys and, therefore, Truth is not like other legal shows.
Almost every lawyer – and, in turn, every legal show – is simply about winning. Proving a case to the jury, navigating the judge, hiring the right investigator, getting the verdict. For Jill, a case is about knowing. Haunted by the specter of helping a guilty man earlier in her career, Jill has set out to avoid ever doing that again. For Jill, the law is not just about winning, it is about determining the truth; about knowing if her client is truly innocent or guilty, and about doing whatever it takes to prove those things. First to herself, then to the world.
And because of this, Jill wins. But she also can’t sleep some nights. She can’t eat other nights. She can’t shake the ghosts and the demons and the knowledge – the very knowledge she needs to have, the very knowledge she acquired through innovative and exhaustive measures – no matter how many cases she takes on. No matter how many wins she piles up. No matter how many news conferences.
Truth isn’t a legal procedural with a case of the week and it’s not even a traditional legal thriller – it is an investigative mystery and a character study in the vein of Mare of Easttown, with shades of The Night Of, that asks: what happens when you dig deeper for the truth than anyone else... and that digging helps you win... but it also comes with a cost? What happens when everything you do to be the best lawyer alive – and to ensure that you only defend the innocent – is the very thing that never lets go of you?
Jill is successful, funny, doesn’t suffer fools, lives and dresses great, and knows how to deal with anyone – be it opposing counsel, a victim of a crime, or a hardened criminal. She is impressive. But when we meet her, she’s been knocked down a peg – coming off personal and professional lows. She puts on a good face around others, but is asking herself why she does what she does and is it worth it? Specifically when it comes to taking on another wrongful conviction case. To that end, Truth tells a riveting, personal story while also showing how wrongful convictions happen. It’s rarely as simple as the cops are horribly corrupt. It’s deeper than that — it’s about what people perceive the truth to be, what they want it to be, and the lengths they’ll go to convince themselves that their truth is the truth.
WRITER
With
Status
In Development
