Ally McBeal
:Ally McBeal (played by Calista Flockhart) is a serious lawyer and a serial kisser, single-minded about what she wants yet subject to multitudinous moods that mutiny against the reign of her Harvard-trained brain. She is bent on marriage and motherhood (but on her own terms) and in the meantime is swept up in the familylike whirl of the weird yet warm Boston law firm where she works. She says what she thinks and especially what she feels, and though she passionately defends the passionate life, she often instantly regrets the words that fly out of her mouth like mischevious spirits. Just as often, she stands by the outrageous things she says. Asked for a compliment, she calls the judge a "pig". She embodies the hopes and dreams most folks hold inside, and not just womenfolk. She's a walking, dancing, air-swimming, pratfalling example of what life might be like if the irrational, inspirational internal world each of us lives in could get loose and take over the world around us. She's a dream girl who wont settle for drab reality, and her dreams are widely shared.
Billy Allen Thomas
:In the first episodes, Billy appears pretty much as a nostalgic reflection in Ally's eyes: the perfect guy, the childhood sweetheart who got away. His transfer to the University of Michigan, allgedly for Law Review, was in reality to pursue Georgia, a woman he felt fated to marry ten minutes after they met. But for a perfect guy, Billy has just a wee flaw or two. The better we get to know him, the more cracks we see in his perfect facade. One thing Billy never wants to put a leash on his Ally's idealistic faith in romance, or anyone's hope for higher love. Billy married Georgia because they're a better match, but he feels the tug of Ally because sometimes she helps him to see shimmering possibilities of what might have been. John Cage
:John Cage is the most miraculously effective attourney in the firm, by far the strangest of the strange crew. He shares a name with the composer John Cage, who is most famous for a composition consisting of several long minutes of silence. In court, Cage orchestrates manipulative silences--those "moments" he takes-- but he has many, many other sounds at his disposal: nose whistles, stomach rumbles he can throw, squeaky shoes, clickers, whooshing blowtorches, tapes of noises making fun of opponents' cases, the bells from "Rocky", show tunes, pop songs, and the theme from "Mr. Ed". He tends to call opponents 'tricksters' but nobody is as much as a trickster as John Cage. Although his longest relationship was with a frog named Stefan, women from Renee to Nelle have been strongly drawn to him from time to time. For a guy named "The Biscuit", he's not really soft, and he's the only member of the firm whose inner world is as weird as Ally's. Or more so. Renee Radick
:Renee Radick is Ally's roommate, confidante, fellow aficionado of ice cream and "Good Night, My Someone", occasional courtroom nemesis as assistant district attourney, attender of weddings and burner of bridesmaids' dresses, and giver and reciever of lots of mostly sound love advice. Renee has been steamrolled in court by Cage and refused to plea bargain on one of Ally's cases, but she never takes their legal roles personally. Renee is almost always down with the Cage/Fish crew dancing at the bar, at parties, and running into Ally on the street at emotionally significant moments. She is a defacto part of the whole firm's life, not just Ally's. Renee and Ally are eachother's greatest defenders and most well-informed accusers. Maybe that's because Ally sees the private side of Renee more than others do. Ally has access to Renee, in a way, and Renee has an all-access pass to Ally's heart in a way that nobody else does. Georgia Thomas
:Georgia Thomas walks into Ally's life as a problem and swiftly develops into a close friend. Like Ally, Georgia was better than Billy in school: Not only did she make Law Review, but she was Billy's editor. Billy had known Ally since age eight, but that's exactly why he doubted that she could possibly be his sweetheart for life. The first time he laid eyes on Georgia he knew she was the one for him. Unfortunatley for Georgia, when Ally walks back into Billy's life, he becomes less sure about his urges. And when Georgia winds up working alongside both of them, libidos erupt and tempers flare. Georgia is peeved to find that Ally's presence seems to improve her relationship with Billy, resents her own growing friendship with Ally, and is understandably enraged that there are areas of her husbands heart that only Ally can access. Richard Fish
:Richard Fish was Ally's most avarious classmate at Harvard law before she joined his firm, and he loves to say he's in it for the money. Still, Fish's very exuberance in saying so betrays a deeper motive: He really started his firm for the malleable fun of it. He states "Let me tell you something, I didn't become a lawyer because I like the law. The law sucks. It's boring. But it can also be used as a weapon. You want to bankrupt somebody? Cost him everything he's worked for, make his wife leave him, even cause his kids to cry? We can do that." He likes lucre--the filthier the better. "It's not just winning, it's winning ugly that matters." Elaine Vassal
:Elaine Vassal is the best secretary a law firm ever had, and also the worst. She's fast, she's organized, and she's willing to sue her own firm to the brink of bankruptcy when the mood strikes. Not that she minds a bit when her class-action lawsuit on behalf of the firm's women is crushed. Far from it--Elaine bounces right back to work on the magic carpet of her own inexhaustible good cheer. She expects to be welcomed back with open arms by the boss she's almost taken to court, and she is welcomed back: Fish lets bygones be bygones. Nelle, Ling, Vonda and Mark to be added later. |
