Floating in a Sea of Mystery
When you hire David Milch, TV's mad genius, to do an HBO drama series about surfing, you aren't gonna get Baywatch. John from Cincinnati (premieres June 10) is, nominally, about an extended family of phenomenally talented surfers — but that's not all that's phenomenal about it. After meeting the mysterious John, characters begin to levitate. A dead bird comes back to life. Clips of the show previewed for critics have a Lynchian look, far removed from the highbrow potty-mouthed realism of Milch's Deadwood. But the series will explore some of his favorite themes, including addiction and philosophy. Milch has said that the mystic goings-on are isnspired by William James' concept of "lawless intrusions" on reality, as well as quantum physics. "Scientists have told us," he says, "that what appears to be matter is energy, that what looks solid is in fact constituted of waves." Really gnarly waves, it looks like.