First airing on NBC back in March, 2005,
Law & Order: Trial By Jury was another series
produced under the long running Law & Order umbrella, which includes the
original Law & Order (one of the longest-running series still on the air), and
its spin off series L&O: Special Victims Unit and L&O: Criminal Intent. Created
by Dick Wolf, the guiding force behind the L&O universe, Trial By Jury tried to
be a more detailed and concise look at the legal process in New York City,
focusing on a pair of female assistant district attorneys--Tracey Kibre, played
by TV and stage veteran Bebe Neuwirth (Cheers; Fraiser) and her assistant Kelly
Gaffney, portrayed by Amy Carlson. Unlike the original Law & Order, which showed
each case through the eyes of the police and then the prosecutors, Trial By Jury
(TBJ) tried to view each case from all sides.
In addition to the prosecutors’ POV, we’re also treated to the POV of the
defense attorneys, their clients, and even the jury members, as they deliberate
a particularly hard case in one episode. Neuwirth and Carlson are extremely
likeable, making their characters very sympathetic and easy to watch, and the
rest of the superb regular cast features Kirk Acevedo
(Band Of Brothers; Fringe) as an investigator for
the ADAs, and Fred Dalton Thompson, who reprises his L&O role as District
Attorney Arthur Branch. Jerry Orbach, a fan favorite who played Detective Lenny
Briscoe on L&O, also reprised his character on TBJ, who was retired from the
NYPD and now worked for the DA’s office as an investigator. Sadly, Orbach only
filmed two episodes of TBJ before passing away from prostate cancer. As his
performances in these last episodes show, he was a dedicated trouper right up to
the end.
TBJ used the same "ripped from the headlines" method of storytelling that the
overall Law & Order franchise thrives on. The episode
Forty-One Shots deals with a man who was shot
excessively by the police during a raid on his apartment.
Blue Wall details the investigation into a gay
teenager who died while in police custody, and Baby Boom
is a heart breaking look at a nanny who may have killed her young charge. The
episode Skeleton offers closure to a storyline
in Law & Order, where the hunt for the man who shot Detective Ed Green
(Jesse L. Martin) begins in earnest. And in the two-part episodes
Night and Day, the
TBJ cast team up with Detectives Elliot Stabler and Olivia Benson from the
Special Victims Unit to solve a nasty case that deals with a serial rapist
(who's very well played to oddball perfection by actor Alfred Molina, best known
as Doc Ock from Spider-Man 2).
The crossover with Special Victims Unit even features the SVU episode Night with
the TBJ episode Day on the same disc (originally both episodes aired back to
back on NBC), thus saving the viewer the bother of trying to find the first half
of this two-parter. Another plus for the DVD set is that while the series itself
was canceled in its first season, it didn’t end on a cliff hanger. All the
episodes (with the exception of Night and Day) are self-contained. I
actually wasn’t very saddened when I heard that TBJ was canceled, because I felt
this series ultimately turned out to be too derivative of the original Law &
Order. But, as a DVD set, it’s very enjoyable, thanks to its good performances
from a fine cast. Fans of TV cop shows, along with the more diehard Law & Order
fans, may really enjoy this set.
--SF
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