Some people like lupins, and some people favour a Love Island vibe with AstroTurf and a hot tub or pool. But in Apples Never Fall , the latest in a series of luxe American dramas to grace our small screens, the Delaney family have converted their entire back garden into a tennis court. You leave the kitchen – usually because you’ve been rowing with one of your ghastly relatives, and you need to re-centre yourself in the soft Florida air – and there it is, just three steps away, complete with an umpire’s chair and one of those machines that looks like a plastic drainpipe from which balls may be fired at regular intervals to the partner-less.
In a Nicole Kidman vehicle, this feature would be hidden behind a neat hedge beyond several miles of immaculate lawn. But in Apples Never Fall , in which Annette Bening fills the vaguely Kidman-shaped space, there’s no room for anything else; the court has fully swallowed the backyard, which must be a kind of metaphor, given that in this show, tennis is a tyrant to which the Delaneys must pay an emotional, physical or monetary tithe for the rest of their lives. Thwack! There goes another family dinner, ruined by the memory of someone’s teenage backhand.
Thwack, thwack! Here’s a tense tie-break, born of emerging secrets and lies. Basically, everyone keeps the score, forever – and no tin cups in sight. But don’t get too excited.
This isn’t Luca Guadagnino’s kinky epic Challengers ; it’s as sexy as a glass of Robinsons.