To lift a title from kids’ novelist Wilson Rawls, this has become the Summer of the Monkeys.
Before we get to HBO’s Chimp Crazy and Netflix’s Secret Lives of Orangutans, devotees of the simian arts will be treated to Apple TV+’s Bad Monkey, a Carl Hiaasen adaptation from the streamer’s comedy patron saint, Bill Lawrence (Ted Lasso, Shrinking).
Bad Monkey
Contrary to the show and novel’s name, the eponymous monkey is not, in fact, bad. Played by veteran animal thespian Crystal — you know her from Community, The Fabelmans and more — she is, in fact, quite good, reliable for reactive cutaways or wild, furry hijinks. She (actually, Crystal is playing a character who seems to identify as male, but we are not going down the path of monkey pronouns here) doesn’t always feel particularly connected to the plot of Bad Monkey, but it’s charming and fun just to have her around.
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And that pretty much sums up my sense of Bad Monkey: As a mystery, or a semi-thriller, it doesn’t work at all; its twists and turns are clumsily executed, its stakes are flimsy and, especially in the finale, its storylines are unconvincingly resolved. It is, however, wry, easygoing and sunbaked in a way that appropriately mirrors Hiaasen’s tone. With a superb cast led by Vince Vaughn, Natalie Martinez, Michelle Monaghan and Jodie Turner-Smith, plus an impeccable eye for Florida locations, this is an agreeable way to spend 10 hours.
And did I mention the monkey?
Vaughan plays Andrew Yancy, a former Miami detective shipped down to the Keys after a scandal and given the ignominious title of restaurant inspector. Yancy has a dogged commitment to the truth and a total lack of self-preservation instincts, which impresses and irritates his friend and former partner Rogelio (John Ortiz).
Professionally, things aren’t great for Yancy, but he’s got a perfect cottage on a picturesque stretch of beach, plus a feisty if enigmatic girlfriend (Monaghan’s Bonnie), so he’s content.
Interrupting that contentment are the slick developer (Alex Moffatt’s Evan) putting up a monstrous McMansion next door to Yancy’s pad and a severed arm that Yancy has been tasked with driving up to Miami. The arm belongs to the husband of Eve (Meredith Hagner), whose grief Yancy finds unconvincing enough that he and saucy medical examiner Rosa (Martinez) begin an investigation.
They’re right to be suspicious, because Eve is connected to shady Christopher (Rob Delaney), another developer, who’s trying to buy up property in a sleepy town in the Bahamas. It’s there that we meet Neville (Ronald Peet), a Bahamian fisherman who shares Yancy’s desire for the simple life and is willing to do anything — including enlisting the Obeah-practicing priestess know as the Dragon Queen (Turner-Smith) — to protect the island’s purity.
Oh, and Neville has a monkey (Crystal) who loves grapes and funerals.
The story is all narrated by a salty, Jimmy Buffett-esque charter boat captain (Tom Nowicki), and expands to encompass an ensemble of eccentrics including Charlotte Lawrence as Eve’s flighty stepdaughter; Zach Braff as a sleazy doctor with the unlikely name of Israel O’Peele; David St. Louis as a soulful thug called Egg; Ashley Nicole Black as a sarcastic government agent; and Lost veteran L. Scott Caldwell as the Dragon Queen’s grandmother, Ya-Ya.
For a few episodes, the narrator bridges the Florida/Bahamas plotlines, consistently promising that it’s all one story even though the fusion is never elegant. A “reveal” at the end of the first episode doesn’t actually reveal anything resembling what the show thinks it reveals, and another at the end of the third episode is more confusing than satisfying. There is, in general, a conflict of sensibilities between director Marcos Siega’s flashier, glossier, darker instincts and the writing team’s looser and lighter strengths. The former contingent approaches Bad Monkey like it’s supposed to be an edge-of-your-seat show, when it really feels like it’s meant to be watched while leaning as far back as humanly possible in a pastel-painted Adirondack. Because when it’s just characters bantering, the series can be delightful.
The interplay between Vaughn, a bit too old for the role and yet effectively roguish, and Martinez, buoyant and flirtatious in a way she’s rarely displayed, is thoroughly appealing. Plus Monaghan comes in and out of the story with that wicked glint in her eye that has been so underutilized since Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, bringing real sizzle to a semi-love-triangle.
Hagner, blending sweet and strychnine, is channeling vintage Goldie Hawn, which is even better if you know that her mother-in-law is … Goldie Hawn. Her bubbly energy has a perfect foil in Delaney, so tall and so glum.
The Bahamas side of the story is, despite the presence of the titular monkey, more dramatic, defined by Peet’s low-key sincerity and Turner-Smith’s fierce intensity. Those two performers get moments of characterization that have nothing to do with murder and scheming. But does Bad Monkey have any insight into, say, touristic exploitation of the Bahamas or Obeah traditions? No.
The show never quite nails Hiaasen’s satirical edge, his very specific perspective on Florida’s grifters and interlopers, settling for soft mockery of corrupt institutions and the nouveau riche. It’s all surface, but when the surface is this pretty — white-sand beaches, sparkling blue water, condensation glistening on a cold beer — you may very well be happy to spend some time on it.
