Early in “The Gilded Age” Season 4, during a moment of great tension, a hoity-toity British doctor in a cravat loses his senses and snaps at Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon): “Let me be clear,” the doctor hisses. “You do not understand the situation. Please leave me.”
Bertha, with little more than a flick of her bulging eyes (which could mean anything from “Oh shit” to “If this goes wrong, I will roast your heart over the raging pyre of your dismembered corpse”), does as she’s urged and retreats. The precarious circumstances don’t allow for pushback — time is of the essence — and Bertha, in her boundless wisdom, knows she has no choice but to trust this man and his alleged expertise.
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But know this, dear readers: Bertha Russell will not be dismissed again.
Not in Season 4, anyway. Much to the relief of Team Bertha acolytes everywhere (there are dozens of us!), the foreboding events at the end of Season 3 do not elicit further defamation for our masterful social climber. That’s not to say her life is suddenly all sunshine and rainbows. (Although let’s be honest: “The Gilded Age” lives — and thrives — in a world of sunshine and rainbows, where a patient who dies because of segregated hospitals is treated with equal consequence to tea that’s served with too much milk.) (Plus, Bertha’s life in particular is pretty darn close to bliss: hot husband, infinite gowns, gobs of money, a dud of a son, sure, but a boring kid isn’t the worst fate — and Gladys married a duke!)
Nevertheless, amid the relative challenges Bertha faces in Season 4, it’s not a spoiler to report that “The Gilded Age” creator Julian Fellowes and his co-writing executive producer Sonja Warfield wisely refrain from punishing their lovingly nicknamed Opera Mommy for the imaginary crimes cooked up by another man who’s taken leave of his senses: Train Daddy (aka George Russell, aka Morgan Spector, aka the future Robert Langdon). In fact, ol’ George has a pretty rough year—a fitting comeuppance for a once-proud titan of industry who needs to be humbled to remember all he has and who’s to thank for it. (Not to mention a fun season-long arc for Spector, whose growling baritone was begging to break bad anyway.)
Season 3 encouraged a thankless take on Bertha, repeatedly trotting out the idea that her pursuit of power blinded her to the needs of her family: a son who (wrongly) blamed her for his breakup with his vanilla crush, Marian (Louisa Jacobson); a daughter who (briefly) blamed her for an arranged marriage that she soon realized was awesome; and a husband who routinely brings his business to the edge of bankruptcy only to be saved by the brilliant ideas and shrewd scheming of his wife — yet who still somehow thought Bertha was the one playing it too fast and loose with their family’s love.
Bertha, after all, is only guilty of doing what’s best for her daughter, raising her family’s clout, and preserving the Russell name as essential benefactors of the arts (that new opera house didn’t open itself) rather than greedy railroad tycoons with terminal severance packages. Suggesting anything else was, to be frank, imbecilic, but “The Gilded Age” played it out through the final shot, where a distraught Bertha watched her jealous husband ride off in a huff after informing her he wouldn’t be coming home until he “knows what he wants.”
That’s where Season 4 picks up: months later, but the mood unchanged. Bertha is on the other side of the ocean, caring for a very pregnant Gladys (Taissa Farmiga), while George is in the States, struggling to keep his business in the black. Elsewhere in New York, Peggy (Denée Benton) savors the success of her first novel while her fiancé, the nice doctor William (Jordan Donica), moves up in the medical ranks. Jack (Ben Ahlers) is getting comfortable in his new house, courtesy of his innovative alarm clocks, but he’s less comfortable with his new status (which requires etiquette classes from his servant friends) and his next invention (which isn’t as easy to sell as the first).
Everyone is moving up! Building careers! Making names for themselves! And then there’s Larry (Harry Richardson) and Marian, who bounce between tedious flirtations and equally tedious frustrations, almost like they’re two attractive twenty-somethings who desperately want to bone but can only get there by boring the pants off each other. Admittedly, Marian gestures toward finding a purpose beyond playing house by volunteering to help the less fortunate, but even Elizabeth Marvel, the program’s guiding hand, struggles to keep our aspiring housewife from dreaming of her sole, snoozy passion.
Luckily, Agnes (Christine Baranski) and Ada (Cynthia Nixon) are more than happy to spice things up: The latter falls for forbidden fruit, and the former hosts the President of the United States.
You read that right: the President of America agrees to have dinner at Agnes’ cozy Manhattan mansion, which provides the seasonal centerpiece “Gilded Age” fans are sure to be sick over: Who’s invited? What will be served? What will they wear? All these gossipy questions and more help structure the better part of Season 4, building ample anticipation for the historic evening by pitting as many of its invited guests against each other as possible in a steel-cage death match of affronted expressions and polite self-satisfaction.
The stakes are set as finely as the silverware, with bragging rights — for socialites and their servers — taking dramatic precedence over the fate of American rail travel, as it should be: In “The Gilded Age,” who saves face is always more substantial than whatever unnamed sums are secured or squandered, and the presence of POTUS does little to upend those pleasingly backward priorities.
Speaking of presence, Season 4 does feel the squeeze of its sprawling cast. It’s a little too light on downstairs character development, even if the dinner involves a few favorites and implements one outstanding plot device I shan’t spoil here. Some supporting players go underutilized (Jack as well as the scheming, wannabe power couple, Oscar and Enid), while unworthy regulars become story anchors entrusted with too much emotional weight. (By now, you surely know to whom I’m referring.)
Ah, so it goes in a series with an insatiable appetite for perpetual opulence and little tolerance for legitimate loss. Far be it from me to say what influences Fellowes, but he seems unwilling to repeat past mistakes or kill off a beloved character — any beloved character — too soon, if at all.
And that’s just fine. Really! We need more cheery, soapy TV filled with simple delights. “The Gilded Age” is the rare HBO Sunday-night staple with even-keeled ambitions and no extra-dour drama. It’s a frothy, let’s-leave-’em-smiling show that’s open to acknowledging serious issues — misogyny, bigotry, and oppression all inform the cast’s choices, to one extent or another — so long as they don’t linger long enough to spoil the vibe.
That’s why Bertha’s ascendance comes as such a relief. Nothing ruins a good time like misplaced sympathy, and siding with the man of the house in a series that’s more rooted in women’s perspectives with each passing season just feels wrong. What little deep thinking “The Gilded Age” invites, there’s something to be said for how it depicts women shaping a country that actively tries to operate outside of their reach. Bertha, with her new money and never-say-die demeanor, isn’t afraid to roll up her sleeves and do whatever it takes. Seeing her shine isn’t just good and right given her specific circumstances (re: George); it’s good and right because it bucks historical precedent (rah-rah, feminism!).
She grasps each situation perfectly — and she’s not going anywhere. Thank goodness.
Grade: B
“The Gilded Age” Season 4 premieres Sunday, November 1 at 9 p.m. ET on HBO. New episodes will be released weekly through the finale on December 20.