Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free
Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.
To be a spy one usually needs to be adept with cutting-edge technology. But when a detective firm starts planning an infiltration operation at a retirement home, all they’re looking for is an undercover agent who knows how to use a smartphone, and — crucially — can remember where they last put it.
A Man on the Inside, an eight-part Netflix comedy series, follows a septuagenarian informant who has been sent to gather intelligence on a suspected thief at a senior citizens’ residence in San Francisco. Remarkably, it’s inspired by a true story, one that inspired the Chilean, Oscar-nominated documentary The Mole Agent (2020), which starts as a semi-farcical espionage caper but ends an intimate portrait of old age and infirmity.
Developed by Michael Schur — the creator of warm, whimsical sitcoms such as The Good Place, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Parks and Recreation — the fictionalised A Man on the Inside leans more toward playful mischief than loss and loneliness. The result is often funny but ultimately anodyne; instead of rawness we get bittersweet sentimentality.
Amiable yet evasive about hard truths, the series is much like its protagonist, Charles (the ever-affable Ted Danson): a retired professor and widower whose search for distraction from his grief lands him a sleuthing gig with private investigator Julie (Lilah Richcreek Estrada). Installed as a resident at Pacific View, his job is to lookout for possible jewel-snatchers.
Not just a mole but a silver fox, Charles is soon waylaid from his mission by drinks, dances and weed-scented, 8pm after-parties. Forget second childhood, this is a second chance at campus life.
At least, that’s how the series chooses to depict an environment perhaps more synonymous with quiet despair than revelry. Although it’s easy to see this as a celebration of the vibrancy of our twilight years, it can also feel uncomfortably sanitising, even infantilising. The only real “adult” here seems to be the facility’s solicitous manager, Didi (Stephanie Beatriz).
Further into the series, however, there are episodes that touch on decline and death, and the toll these take on Charles, who makes the rookie mistake of starting to care for the other residents. He might not be a natural spy, but there’s no doubting he’s a very good man inside.
★★★☆☆
On Netflix from November 21