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The Wife: A Woman at Her Breaking Point

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In a role that seems modeled for her, Glenn Close, a resolute, formidable actress over the years in such productions as TV’s Damages and the now-classic, Fatal Attraction, expertly internalizes her character, Joan Castleman, in The Wife. After a deceptively light introduction into Joan’s marriage to Joe, played by the perfectly cast Jonathan Pryce (TV’s Game of Thrones and Wolf Hall), who is about to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature, she simmers and seethes in the background. At first, there’s just a hint of trouble beneath the surface, but as the close-up shots prevail, Joan’s face shifts from subtle discomfort to more concentrated. One wonders, as does Joe, what lies behind her steely jaw, but increasingly wistful eyes.

In a pattern familiar to some gray-haired, long-married couples, she plays out her tasks as her husband’s caretaker and caters to his needs, but resists stereotype. Nathaniel Bone, a persistent writer played by Christian Slater (TV’s Mr. Robot and Milo Murphy’s Law), who wants to do a biography of Joe, pursues Joan and tries to manipulate her into revealing herself as a long-suffering wife, because of Joe’s “various indiscretions.”

“Please don’t paint me as a victim,” she insists, “I’m much more interesting than that.”

And so she is. Seen in flashbacks to her beginning with Joe, who was then a young, married professor (Harry Lloyd: The Iron Lady, TV’s Counterpart), Joan aspires to be a writer and takes his class. Played by Annie Starke (Albert Nobbs, We Don’t Belong Here), the young Joan is smitten, so she listens to his patronizing critiques and to others in 1958 who discourage her. In a cameo, Elizabeth McGovern (The Commuter, TV’s Downton Abbey), playing a jaded writer, dismisses Joan’s passion.

“A writer needs to be read,” she says, slamming the male-dominated publishing business (although women were visible, such as Flannery O’Connor and poets, Sylvia Plath, and Gwendolyn Brooks).

For Joan, the obstacles may seem overwhelming, but the seeds of Joan’s discontent—that it’s not so simple as her resenting taking second place—begin to seep through. Swedish director Björn Runge (Happy End, Mouth to Mouth), knows to focus on Close’s ability to transform herself. Pryce also complements her by making Joe a frustrating philanderer and needy, self-absorbed man who slowly picks at Joan’s rage so it rises to the surface. He is convincing as one who tragically slips away from maintaining his image of a prolific, once-witty author who is puzzled that his wife can no longer bear his tributes to her.

To add more tension, the couple’s son, David, played by a suitably brooding Max Irons (Woman in Gold, TV’s Condor), challenges his parents at every turn during their trip to Stockholm to receive the Nobel. Irons overworks David’s jagged psyche a bit, but doesn’t detract from the mood. Bone artfully talks into his victim’s ear like a Satan-like figure, and persuades David to doubt his father. The son still seeks his approval as a fledgling writer himself, which Joe never gives. Joan acts as arbitrator, which becomes more challenging with each scene. While Joan still protects her husband, she is coming to a breaking point.

Joan now strains at every juncture of Joe’s behavior, so that when she finally erupts, the release is all the more cathartic. A painful end leads to a sliver of light with Joan’s last, penetrating look into the camera. Close cements her powerful, Oscar-worthy performance, with the help of her capable, steady co-stars.

Rated R