Get Me a Lawyer
Encyclopedia
"Get Me a Lawyer" is the pilot episode of the legal drama
series Damages
, which first aired on July 24, 2007 on FX in the United States. It was written by series creators/executive producers Todd A. Kessler
, Glenn Kessler
and Daniel Zelman
, and was directed by producer Allen Coulter
. In the episode, recent law school graduate Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne
) is recruited to Hewes and Associates, a law firm headed by Patty Hewes (Glenn Close
), where she is assigned to the "Frobisher case". Billionaire Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson
) is being sued by his former employees, whom he advised to invest in his company while unloading his own stock, and while Frobisher's attorney Ray Fiske (Željko Ivanek
) pleads for a settlement price, Patty insists on taking the case to court.
When the Kesslers and Zelman devised the series, they did not specifically intend for Patty and Ellen to be lawyers, wanting primarily to explore the power structures between two strong women—Patty and her protégée Ellen—and choosing a profession afterwards. Close agreed to play Patty so long as the series was filmed in New York
, where she resides. To prepare for their roles, Close, Byrne and Tate Donovan
met with corporate lawyers, while Danson met with the CEOs of Fortune 500
companies. The pilot was filmed in February and FX placed a 13-episode order for the series in March. Its American airing brought in 3.7 million viewers and it was reviewed positively by most critics. It received two Emmy Award
nominations for writing
and directing
and one win for Close for Lead Actress in a Drama Series
. It was also nominated for an American Cinema Editors Award
.
) and Rosario Ortiz (Maya Days), find in her pocket a business card for Hollis M. Nye.
In an extended flashback to six months earlier, the woman is revealed to be Ellen Parsons, a recent law school graduate. She turns down a generous salary from Nye's firm to meet with Patty Hewes, head of Hewes and Associates. Later at a bar, Ellen meets Nye (Philip Bosco
), who cautions that Patty is dangerous and has her sign a card reading "I was warned." Ellen finds out that her interview with Patty is on the day of her sister's wedding. She declines the interview but Patty, intrigued to have been turned down, finds Ellen at the wedding and hires her.
Patty is the lead attorney in a high-profile litigation, representing the bankrupted workers of a large company run by Frobisher, who allegedly advised his employees to invest in the company while selling his own stock. Patty insists on taking the case to trial rather than accepting a settlement, but on Ellen's first day it is revealed that the prosecution cannot yet link Frobisher to his stockbroker—though both were in Palm Beach, Florida
over the same weekend—and thus cannot disprove that the selling of his stock was not pre-arranged. When Ellen returns home, her boyfriend David Connor (Noah Bean
) proposes to her and she accepts.
Frobisher's attorney Ray Fiske visits David's sister Katie (Anastasia Griffith
), who is opening a restaurant in which Frobisher is investing, and asks her to sign a confidentiality agreement. Frobisher meets with his former custodian Larry Popler (Victor Arnold), who names a settlement price of $100 million, which Ray returns to Patty. Patty persuades her clients to decline the offer, but Larry mentions a previous agreement to accept any offer of $100 million. Patty suspects that her advisor Tom (Tate Donovan
) had known about the agreement and fires him. Katie, meanwhile, thinks that she is being watched, and tells Ellen and David that she had catered a function for Frobisher in Florida and that afterwards he had offered to help her open a restaurant. Ellen realizes that Patty hired her to get to Katie, a potential witness. Though Katie is initially hesitant to testify, she finds her dog Saffron dead in her apartment with a note reading "Quiet" pinned to a wall. Assuming that Frobisher is responsible, she agrees to meet with Patty to help bring Frobisher down. Tom meets with Patty, who had only pretended to fire him, and gives her Saffron's collar, which she throws into the ocean.
Returning to the present, the two detectives seek Nye out and he identifies Ellen. They visit Ellen and David's apartment and find David dead in the bathtub. Ortiz tells Ellen to explain what had happened, and Ellen's only response is "Get me a lawyer."
case "a big part" of the inspiration for Patty's main case involving Arthur Frobisher, though Zelman claims that Enron was not used as a basis in particular: "It was more just the culture of all those corporate scandals at the time. There seemed to be one after the other of them, and we became very interested in sort of the characters who were a part of those scandals."
After co-starring on 2004's fourth season of The Shield
on cable network FX, Close told network president John Landgraf that she would be open to star in another series, suggesting a spin-off
for her Shield character, Captain Monica Rawling. Landgraf pitched Damages to Close, who agreed to play Patty so long as the series was shot in New York City
, where she resides. To prepare for her role, Close met New York attorney Mary Jo White
and her partner Lorna Scoffield, as well as litigator Patricia Hines, from whom Close learned "some extraordinary things". The producers sought after Byrne to play Ellen, but she was unavailable during the first round of auditions as she was filming 28 Weeks Later
. She says the opportunity "came up again, so I went in, auditioned, and got the role". Like Close, Byrne spent time with a female lawyer in New York and read books written by litigators Alan Dershowitz
and David DuBois, while Donovan talked to his uncle, a New York corporate lawyer. He visited Manhattan's Centre Street
courts, where he "followed the most intense murder trial". Ivanek was so eager to work on the series that he auditioned for two different roles, and was cast as Ray. Todd Kessler said that Danson's 1979 film The Onion Field
was "a huge influence on Glenn, Daniel and myself, and that was something that had always stuck in our minds. And when we sought out to cast this role of Arthur Frobisher, Ted kind of came into focus." In preparation for his role, the producers asked Danson to meet with CEO
s of Fortune 500
corporations and watch documentaries such as Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
, which examines the collapse of Enron. They also suggested that Danson meet with Close's acting coach Harold Guskin. The producers said that David and Katie were the hardest characters to cast. Noah Bean, who felt that he gave "an awful first audition" for the role of David, was called in for a second reading as he was waiting for an elevator to leave the building, and was ultimately cast. British actress Anastasia Griffith's agent informed her of the audition for the role of Katie only two hours before it began. When she met the producers, they were initially concerned about a Brit playing an American, especially since Australian Byrne had already signed on. "To put their fears at rest", Griffith addressed the producers in an American accent from beginning to end of the audition. After being cast, Griffith and Byrne visited New York University
dialect coach
Deborah Hecht to perfect their accents.
The episode was shot in February and edited in March 2007. Filming took place on location
at various sites around Manhattan
; after the first season had been greenlit
, sets
were built at New York's Steiner Studios
. Byrne said that filming the opening scene on a winter's morning in only underwear and a coat was "very traumatic" and "very hard". The series remained untitled during casting and filming, and was named Damages after FX had greenlit the pilot and placed a 13-episode order for the first season in March.
brought in 999,000 viewers, making Damages the thirteenth most-watched show of the night. In Britain, BBC One
's airing of the episode was seen by 1.9 million people with a share of 11%.
Most critics reviewed "Get Me a Lawyer" positively. The New York Times
Alessandra Stanley praised FX for choosing another series that "keep[s] the light focused on the dark side of its main characters". Stanley wrote that "Damages is yet another show that requires viewers to tune in to every episode to follow the plot, but it is the most grown-up thriller in the pack [of serialized drama series]." Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle
wrote that, in the episode, "All the drama is in the writing and the acting." He complimented the "strong cast", stating that "it's Close who makes Damages a series to contend with". Writing for The Age
, Robin Oliver called the pilot "terrific-going-on-sensational". She praised Close and Byrne's performances, but also highlighted Danson's role as "a particularly fine piece of casting". Oliver's Age colleague Melinda Houston called Close "delicious – and convincing" as Patty and thought that the script was "fabulous". S. P. Miskowski of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
remarked, "For my money, this is what a 'thriller' is all about." TV Squad's Jonathan Toomey enjoyed the episode's flashbacks, saying that the style of the show "works and it works well". Matt Mitovich claimed in a TV Guide
recap of the episode, "What a pilot it was!" He praised the acting from Close, Danson and Byrne, while he felt that "the supporting cast is excellent as well". Stuart Levine, writing for Variety
, called the pilot his favorite episode of the first season.
Other critics, however, did not respond well to the episode. Andrew Billen of The Times
thought that the episode was "not as stylish, intelligent or classy as it hopes" and "about as subtle as Times Square
". He called Close's performance "not remotely credible but impressive in a Norma Desmond way" and labeled Byrne as "particularly unstriking". Brian Lowry gave the pilot a lukewarm review for Variety. He praised the "solid cast" and "smart dialogue", but felt that "the template feels a little too familiar ... moreover, it's fuzzy how long the show's mystery will persist". Entertainment Weekly
s Gillian Flynn graded the episode as a C−, criticizing the characters' lack of logic and the "many ludicrous scenes". She thought the storylines to be overly complicated and called Byrne "bland" and "inexpressive".
"Get Me a Lawyer" received two Primetime Emmy Award
nominations: Allen Coulter was nominated for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series
, and Glenn Kessler, Todd Kessler and Daniel Zelman were nominated for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series. The pilot episode was submitted to the Primetime Emmys judging panel for determining the nominees for Outstanding Drama Series
; Damages was nominated but did not win the award. Close chose the episode as her Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series
submission; she was nominated and went on to win the award. Editor
Malcolm Jamieson was nominated for an American Cinema Editors Award
for his work on this episode in the "Best Edited One-Hour TV Series (Commercial Television)" category.
Legal drama
A legal drama is a work of dramatic fiction about crime and civil litigation. Subtypes of legal dramas include courtroom dramas and legal thrillers, and come in all forms, including novels, television shows, and films. Legal drama sometimes overlap with crime drama, most notably in the case of Law...
series Damages
Damages (TV series)
Damages is an American television drama series created by the writing and production trio of Daniel Zelman and brothers Glenn and Todd A. Kessler . It is broadcast in the United States on the DirecTV channel Audience Network after originally airing on FX and is produced by the creators' own...
, which first aired on July 24, 2007 on FX in the United States. It was written by series creators/executive producers Todd A. Kessler
Todd A. Kessler
Todd A. Kessler is an American screenwriter, playwright, television producer and director. He is the co-creator and head writer of the FX drama series Damages...
, Glenn Kessler
Glenn Kessler (screenwriter)
Glenn Kessler is an American screenwriter and television producer. Kessler grew up in suburban Detroit suburb and graduated from the Cranbrook Kingswood School in Bloomfield Hills in 1988. He is the co-creator and executive producer of the Golden Globe award-winning FX drama series Damages along...
and Daniel Zelman
Daniel Zelman
Daniel Zelman is an American actor, screenwriter and television producer. Zelman is the husband of former Will & Grace and The Starter Wife star Debra Messing. The couple have a son, Roman Walker Zelman, born in 2004. Zelman is an executive producer on the FX drama series Damages, which he...
, and was directed by producer Allen Coulter
Allen Coulter
Allen Coulter is an American television and film director, credited with a number of successful television programs. He has directed two feature films, Hollywoodland, a film regarding the questionable death of George Reeves starring Adrien Brody, Diane Lane, and Ben Affleck, and 2010's Remember...
. In the episode, recent law school graduate Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne
Rose Byrne
Mary Rose Byrne is an Australian actress.Byrne made her screen debut in 1994 with a small role in the film Dallas Doll...
) is recruited to Hewes and Associates, a law firm headed by Patty Hewes (Glenn Close
Glenn Close
Glenn Close is an American actress and singer of theatre and film, known for her roles as a femme fatale Glenn Close (born March 19, 1947) is an American actress and singer of theatre and film, known for her roles as a femme fatale Glenn Close (born March 19, 1947) is an American actress and...
), where she is assigned to the "Frobisher case". Billionaire Arthur Frobisher (Ted Danson
Ted Danson
Edward Bridge “Ted” Danson III is an American actor best known for his role as central character Sam Malone in the sitcom Cheers, and his role as Dr. John Becker on the series Becker. He also plays a recurring role on Larry David's HBO sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm and starred alongside Glenn Close...
) is being sued by his former employees, whom he advised to invest in his company while unloading his own stock, and while Frobisher's attorney Ray Fiske (Željko Ivanek
Željko Ivanek
Željko Ivanek is an Emmy award-winning Slovenian American actor best known for his role as Ray Fiske on Damages. He is also known for playing Blake Sterling on short-lived NBC series The Event and Emile Danko on Heroes....
) pleads for a settlement price, Patty insists on taking the case to court.
When the Kesslers and Zelman devised the series, they did not specifically intend for Patty and Ellen to be lawyers, wanting primarily to explore the power structures between two strong women—Patty and her protégée Ellen—and choosing a profession afterwards. Close agreed to play Patty so long as the series was filmed in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, where she resides. To prepare for their roles, Close, Byrne and Tate Donovan
Tate Donovan
Tate Buckley Donovan is an American actor. He is known for his role in the FX drama Damages, as Tom Shayes, and for his role as Jimmy Cooper in the American teen drama television series The O.C....
met with corporate lawyers, while Danson met with the CEOs of Fortune 500
Fortune 500
The Fortune 500 is an annual list compiled and published by Fortune magazine that ranks the top 500 U.S. closely held and public corporations as ranked by their gross revenue after adjustments made by Fortune to exclude the impact of excise taxes companies collect. The list includes publicly and...
companies. The pilot was filmed in February and FX placed a 13-episode order for the series in March. Its American airing brought in 3.7 million viewers and it was reviewed positively by most critics. It received two Emmy Award
Primetime Emmy Award
The Primetime Emmy Awards are awards presented by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in American primetime television programming...
nominations for writing
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series
The Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series is awarded to one television episode each year at the Primetime Emmy Awards. Often regarded as the highest honor that can be bestowed upon an individual episode of television, the nominees and winners often reflect outstanding achievement in...
and directing
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series
The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series is an Emmy presented to the best directing of a television drama series.-Best Direction of a Single Program of a Drama Series:*1959: Jack Smight – Alcoa-Goodyear Theatre ...
and one win for Close for Lead Actress in a Drama Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress - Drama Series
This is a list of winners of the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress – a Drama Series.-Superlatives:-1950s:*1952: Helen Hayes*1953: no award*1954: Loretta Young – The Loretta Young Show*1955: no award...
. It was also nominated for an American Cinema Editors Award
American Cinema Editors Awards 2007
The 58th ACE Eddie Awards were held on 17 February 2008 in the International Ballroom, Beverly Hilton Hotel, Los Angeles, California, USA; the nominees and winners are listed below.-Film: Best Edited Film - Dramatic:...
.
Plot
A young woman steps out of an elevator, bloody and half-naked. She leaves the building and runs down a busy street. She is taken to a police station, where two detectives, Dan Williams (Casey SiemaszkoCasey Siemaszko
Casey Siemaszko is an American actor and the brother of actress Nina Siemaszko. He was born in Chicago, Illinois on March 17, 1961 to a Polish American father, a fighter in the Polish Underground who survived the Sachsenhausen concentration camp and an English mother.Siemaszko's best known film...
) and Rosario Ortiz (Maya Days), find in her pocket a business card for Hollis M. Nye.
In an extended flashback to six months earlier, the woman is revealed to be Ellen Parsons, a recent law school graduate. She turns down a generous salary from Nye's firm to meet with Patty Hewes, head of Hewes and Associates. Later at a bar, Ellen meets Nye (Philip Bosco
Philip Bosco
-Personal life:Bosco was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, the son of Margaret Raymond , a policewoman, and Philip Lupo Bosco, a carnival worker. Bosco went to high school at St. Peter's Preparatory School in Jersey City. He attended the Catholic University of Washington, D.C. Bosco married Nancy...
), who cautions that Patty is dangerous and has her sign a card reading "I was warned." Ellen finds out that her interview with Patty is on the day of her sister's wedding. She declines the interview but Patty, intrigued to have been turned down, finds Ellen at the wedding and hires her.
Patty is the lead attorney in a high-profile litigation, representing the bankrupted workers of a large company run by Frobisher, who allegedly advised his employees to invest in the company while selling his own stock. Patty insists on taking the case to trial rather than accepting a settlement, but on Ellen's first day it is revealed that the prosecution cannot yet link Frobisher to his stockbroker—though both were in Palm Beach, Florida
Palm Beach, Florida
The Town of Palm Beach is an incorporated town in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The Intracoastal Waterway separates it from the neighboring cities of West Palm Beach and Lake Worth...
over the same weekend—and thus cannot disprove that the selling of his stock was not pre-arranged. When Ellen returns home, her boyfriend David Connor (Noah Bean
Noah Bean
Noah Bean is an American actor best known for his role as David Connor on the FX legal drama Damages and as Ryan Fletcher on the The CW action series Nikita.-Career:...
) proposes to her and she accepts.
Frobisher's attorney Ray Fiske visits David's sister Katie (Anastasia Griffith
Anastasia Griffith
Anastasia Griffith is a British actress known for her roles on the FX legal drama Damages and the NBC series Trauma.-Career:...
), who is opening a restaurant in which Frobisher is investing, and asks her to sign a confidentiality agreement. Frobisher meets with his former custodian Larry Popler (Victor Arnold), who names a settlement price of $100 million, which Ray returns to Patty. Patty persuades her clients to decline the offer, but Larry mentions a previous agreement to accept any offer of $100 million. Patty suspects that her advisor Tom (Tate Donovan
Tate Donovan
Tate Buckley Donovan is an American actor. He is known for his role in the FX drama Damages, as Tom Shayes, and for his role as Jimmy Cooper in the American teen drama television series The O.C....
) had known about the agreement and fires him. Katie, meanwhile, thinks that she is being watched, and tells Ellen and David that she had catered a function for Frobisher in Florida and that afterwards he had offered to help her open a restaurant. Ellen realizes that Patty hired her to get to Katie, a potential witness. Though Katie is initially hesitant to testify, she finds her dog Saffron dead in her apartment with a note reading "Quiet" pinned to a wall. Assuming that Frobisher is responsible, she agrees to meet with Patty to help bring Frobisher down. Tom meets with Patty, who had only pretended to fire him, and gives her Saffron's collar, which she throws into the ocean.
Returning to the present, the two detectives seek Nye out and he identifies Ellen. They visit Ellen and David's apartment and find David dead in the bathtub. Ortiz tells Ellen to explain what had happened, and Ellen's only response is "Get me a lawyer."
Production
Brothers Glenn and Todd Kessler decided to work with Daniel Zelman because "we have a third brother, but Daniel is kind of like our fourth brother that we've known for over 20 years." When the Kesslers and Zelman devised the series, they did not specifically intend for Patty and Ellen to be lawyers. They wanted to explore the power structures in two strong women—feeling that the male power dynamics had been seen before—and considered a number of professions, including entertainment and pharmaceuticals, before deciding on law. Zelman said that the writers' main motivation to write about the law "was our interest in power dynamics, the dynamics of power in society. We're very much interested in the ambiguity of it. We're just interested in seeing how far we can push these characters." According to Kessler, "One thing that's crucial is that Patty Hewes is on one end of the spectrum and Ellen Parsons is on the other." The relationship the writers were most interested in showing was that between a mentor and a mentee, which is represented by Patty and her protégée Ellen. Todd Kessler called the real life EnronEnron
Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. Before its bankruptcy on December 2, 2001, Enron employed approximately 22,000 staff and was one of the world's leading electricity, natural gas, communications, and pulp and paper companies, with...
case "a big part" of the inspiration for Patty's main case involving Arthur Frobisher, though Zelman claims that Enron was not used as a basis in particular: "It was more just the culture of all those corporate scandals at the time. There seemed to be one after the other of them, and we became very interested in sort of the characters who were a part of those scandals."
The Shield
The Shield is an American television drama series starring Michael Chiklis which premiered on March 12, 2002 on FX in the United States and concluded on November 25, 2008 after seven seasons...
on cable network FX, Close told network president John Landgraf that she would be open to star in another series, suggesting a spin-off
Spin-off (media)
In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
for her Shield character, Captain Monica Rawling. Landgraf pitched Damages to Close, who agreed to play Patty so long as the series was shot in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, where she resides. To prepare for her role, Close met New York attorney Mary Jo White
Mary Jo White
Mary Jo White was the first woman to be U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, serving from 1993 to 2002.White was born in Kansas City, Missouri and grew up in McLean, Virginia. She received her B.S...
and her partner Lorna Scoffield, as well as litigator Patricia Hines, from whom Close learned "some extraordinary things". The producers sought after Byrne to play Ellen, but she was unavailable during the first round of auditions as she was filming 28 Weeks Later
28 Weeks Later
28 Weeks Later is a 2007 British/Spanish film sequel to the 2002 post-apocalyptic horror film 28 Days Later. 28 Weeks Later was directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo and released in the United Kingdom and United States on 11 May 2007...
. She says the opportunity "came up again, so I went in, auditioned, and got the role". Like Close, Byrne spent time with a female lawyer in New York and read books written by litigators Alan Dershowitz
Alan Dershowitz
Alan Morton Dershowitz is an American lawyer, jurist, and political commentator. He has spent most of his career at Harvard Law School where in 1967, at the age of 28, he became the youngest full professor of law in its history...
and David DuBois, while Donovan talked to his uncle, a New York corporate lawyer. He visited Manhattan's Centre Street
Centre Street (Manhattan)
Centre Street runs north-south in the New York City borough of Manhattan. Centre Street runs from Park Row and continues north to Delancey Street where it merges with Lafayette Street....
courts, where he "followed the most intense murder trial". Ivanek was so eager to work on the series that he auditioned for two different roles, and was cast as Ray. Todd Kessler said that Danson's 1979 film The Onion Field
The Onion Field
The Onion Field is a 1973 nonfiction book by Joseph Wambaugh, a sergeant for the Los Angeles Police Department, chronicling the kidnapping of two plainclothes LAPD officers by a pair of criminals during an evening traffic stop and the subsequent murder of Officer Ian James Campbell.- Crime :On the...
was "a huge influence on Glenn, Daniel and myself, and that was something that had always stuck in our minds. And when we sought out to cast this role of Arthur Frobisher, Ted kind of came into focus." In preparation for his role, the producers asked Danson to meet with CEO
Chief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
s of Fortune 500
Fortune 500
The Fortune 500 is an annual list compiled and published by Fortune magazine that ranks the top 500 U.S. closely held and public corporations as ranked by their gross revenue after adjustments made by Fortune to exclude the impact of excise taxes companies collect. The list includes publicly and...
corporations and watch documentaries such as Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is a 2005 documentary film based on the best-selling 2003 book of the same name by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, a study of one of the largest business scandals in American history...
, which examines the collapse of Enron. They also suggested that Danson meet with Close's acting coach Harold Guskin. The producers said that David and Katie were the hardest characters to cast. Noah Bean, who felt that he gave "an awful first audition" for the role of David, was called in for a second reading as he was waiting for an elevator to leave the building, and was ultimately cast. British actress Anastasia Griffith's agent informed her of the audition for the role of Katie only two hours before it began. When she met the producers, they were initially concerned about a Brit playing an American, especially since Australian Byrne had already signed on. "To put their fears at rest", Griffith addressed the producers in an American accent from beginning to end of the audition. After being cast, Griffith and Byrne visited New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
dialect coach
Dialect coach
A dialect coach assists an actor in assuming a certain regional or foreign accent to perform convincingly in radio, theatrical or film productions. Dialect coaches are skilled in pronunciation and phonetics , and do not necessarily have to have the accent that they are teaching, though it may be...
Deborah Hecht to perfect their accents.
The episode was shot in February and edited in March 2007. Filming took place on location
Filming location
A filming location is a place where some or all of a film or television series is produced, in addition to or instead of using sets constructed on a movie studio backlot or soundstage...
at various sites around Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
; after the first season had been greenlit
Greenlight
To green-light a project is to give permission or a go ahead to move forward with a project. In the context of the movie and TV businesses, to green-light something is to formally approve its production finance, thereby allowing the project to move forward from the development phase to...
, sets
Set construction
Set construction is the process by which a set designer works in collaboration with the director of a production to create the set for a theatrical, film or television production...
were built at New York's Steiner Studios
Steiner Studios
Steiner Studios is the largest film and television production studio complex outside of Hollywood. Steiner Studios offers of soundstages, with air conditioning and power infrastructure, and an additional of offices, dressing and make-up rooms, mill shops, spray booths, prop lock-ups, etc. All...
. Byrne said that filming the opening scene on a winter's morning in only underwear and a coat was "very traumatic" and "very hard". The series remained untitled during casting and filming, and was named Damages after FX had greenlit the pilot and placed a 13-episode order for the first season in March.
Reception
As the most-watched basic cable show of the night, "Get Me a Lawyer" drew 3.7 million viewers on its initial commercial-free airing, with a total of 5.1 million including the viewers of repeat airings later in the night. 1.2 million people fell into the target demographic of adults aged 18–49, while 1.5 million fell into the 25–54 age bracket. FX president John Landgraf deemed the pilot's ratings "middling" by the network's standards. The Australian premiere on the Nine NetworkNine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
brought in 999,000 viewers, making Damages the thirteenth most-watched show of the night. In Britain, BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
's airing of the episode was seen by 1.9 million people with a share of 11%.
Most critics reviewed "Get Me a Lawyer" positively. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
Alessandra Stanley praised FX for choosing another series that "keep[s] the light focused on the dark side of its main characters". Stanley wrote that "Damages is yet another show that requires viewers to tune in to every episode to follow the plot, but it is the most grown-up thriller in the pack [of serialized drama series]." Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
wrote that, in the episode, "All the drama is in the writing and the acting." He complimented the "strong cast", stating that "it's Close who makes Damages a series to contend with". Writing for The Age
The Age
The Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
, Robin Oliver called the pilot "terrific-going-on-sensational". She praised Close and Byrne's performances, but also highlighted Danson's role as "a particularly fine piece of casting". Oliver's Age colleague Melinda Houston called Close "delicious – and convincing" as Patty and thought that the script was "fabulous". S. P. Miskowski of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is an online newspaper and former print newspaper covering Seattle, Washington, United States, and the surrounding metropolitan area...
remarked, "For my money, this is what a 'thriller' is all about." TV Squad's Jonathan Toomey enjoyed the episode's flashbacks, saying that the style of the show "works and it works well". Matt Mitovich claimed in a TV Guide
TV Guide
TV Guide is a weekly American magazine with listings of TV shows.In addition to TV listings, the publication features television-related news, celebrity interviews, gossip and film reviews and crossword puzzles...
recap of the episode, "What a pilot it was!" He praised the acting from Close, Danson and Byrne, while he felt that "the supporting cast is excellent as well". Stuart Levine, writing for Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
, called the pilot his favorite episode of the first season.
Other critics, however, did not respond well to the episode. Andrew Billen of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
thought that the episode was "not as stylish, intelligent or classy as it hopes" and "about as subtle as Times Square
Times Square
Times Square is a major commercial intersection in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, at the junction of Broadway and Seventh Avenue and stretching from West 42nd to West 47th Streets...
". He called Close's performance "not remotely credible but impressive in a Norma Desmond way" and labeled Byrne as "particularly unstriking". Brian Lowry gave the pilot a lukewarm review for Variety. He praised the "solid cast" and "smart dialogue", but felt that "the template feels a little too familiar ... moreover, it's fuzzy how long the show's mystery will persist". Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
s Gillian Flynn graded the episode as a C−, criticizing the characters' lack of logic and the "many ludicrous scenes". She thought the storylines to be overly complicated and called Byrne "bland" and "inexpressive".
"Get Me a Lawyer" received two Primetime Emmy Award
60th Primetime Emmy Awards
The 60th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards was held on Sunday, September 21, 2008, at the newly opened Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles, California. They were hosted by Tom Bergeron, Heidi Klum, Howie Mandel, Jeff Probst, and Ryan Seacrest and televised in the United States on ABC.The Creative Arts Awards...
nominations: Allen Coulter was nominated for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series
The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series is an Emmy presented to the best directing of a television drama series.-Best Direction of a Single Program of a Drama Series:*1959: Jack Smight – Alcoa-Goodyear Theatre ...
, and Glenn Kessler, Todd Kessler and Daniel Zelman were nominated for Outstanding Writing for a Drama Series. The pilot episode was submitted to the Primetime Emmys judging panel for determining the nominees for Outstanding Drama Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series
This page lists the winners and nominees for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series, since its institution in 1951. The award is often cited as one of the "main awards" at the Emmys ceremonies, and has changed names many times in its history. It was first called Best Dramatic Show...
; Damages was nominated but did not win the award. Close chose the episode as her Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress - Drama Series
This is a list of winners of the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress – a Drama Series.-Superlatives:-1950s:*1952: Helen Hayes*1953: no award*1954: Loretta Young – The Loretta Young Show*1955: no award...
submission; she was nominated and went on to win the award. Editor
Film editing
Film editing is part of the creative post-production process of filmmaking. It involves the selection and combining of shots into sequences, and ultimately creating a finished motion picture. It is an art of storytelling...
Malcolm Jamieson was nominated for an American Cinema Editors Award
American Cinema Editors Awards 2007
The 58th ACE Eddie Awards were held on 17 February 2008 in the International Ballroom, Beverly Hilton Hotel, Los Angeles, California, USA; the nominees and winners are listed below.-Film: Best Edited Film - Dramatic:...
for his work on this episode in the "Best Edited One-Hour TV Series (Commercial Television)" category.