Sean Parker
I honestly didn’t know what to make of The Trouble with Tessa when I first heard about it. The image was striking, and it looked as though Screambox used the same artist who did the poster work for their anthology series, Tales from the Void, as I stared closely at the watercolor art with tempered lighting featuring a twisted duality of opposing silhouettes. While I hold out hope that Tales from the Void returns for future episodes, I also secretly hoped The Trouble with Tessa would be just as fun. A few weeks ago, Shudder premiered their bingeable summer series, Hell Motel, and while I have been watching that with a fleeting curiosity for how it all turns out, I have never hit the enter button as fast on my remote as I did when episode one of The Trouble with Tessa finished.
Katrin Nugent stars as the titular Tessa Fowler, a documentarian whose latest film questioning the morals of a local hero has sent Tessa running away from the city and into the remote upstate township of Lowrey. Lowrey’s a little like that Maine town MGM+’s The Institute introduced us to this week, where everything is pretty analog, although Lowrey goes the extra mile by being an immutable cash-only town. Tessa is like any of us when we go looking for escape, in desperate need of sleeping in and a nice bottle of something to help them unwind to get there.
When Tessa first arrives at the house, I was a little skeptical of the series. Tessa meets their realtor, Simon (Taso Mikroulis), who has locked Tessa into a month-long rental agreement, but the entire scene feels extraordinarily rushed. Perhaps that’s on purpose, and all will be revealed to us later, but the first episode is so short, just under twenty-two minutes, and even if syndication is a future option for The Trouble with Tessa, I still think there was some time to work with. Regardless, Simon mentions rules, the basement, and keeping the door unlocked… and it’s all very House of the Devil creepy. Once Simon leaves, Tessa airs out the space and the pace.
One of the first things any movie or television fan is going to notice about The Trouble with Tessa is its incredible cinematography. Dennis Cahlo, who also serves as a co-director, co-writer, editor, producer, and actor on the show (alongside Bethany Watson sharing many of the same credits), sets up magnificent shots within Tessa’s new abode, capturing an oddly minimalist aesthetic even if it’s inundated with illustrious yesteryear trinkets. It’s like if your grandma found a lamp she used to own at Savers and has just the place for it, even if it looks slightly off in the room. One of the first things Tessa does is sit down by a pile of outdated reading material, donned with plants, gold cat bookends, and a Beethoven bust. The paintings on the wall are artfully generic, too, but I doubt Tessa noticed while thumbing through Amy Vanderbilt’s Complete Book of Etiquette.
That is also lingering in the air here: the idea of perfection. Everyone keeps selling the idea of Lowrey as a nice place to live, though the caveats of concessions remain present as outdated civilities loom. Tessa comes to Lowrey feeling the brunt of uncivilized discourse that makes them feel inadequate, and finds a place that may be attempting to change them. But Lowrey is unaware of how vigilant the documentarian can be, which makes Tessa a fantastic character to follow. No matter how much someone tries to hide the truth, Tessa’s prepared to dig it up… with a shovel if they must.
What’s more, the production design seems fitting. On the surface, everything appears normal. But that certain nagging sensation settles in from the observable pieces that don’t quite fit. It’s allegorical to Lowrey in the same way.
Tessa sits in bed with the book later, and the shot is perfect. The bed is framed in the center with a focus on the royal blue satin sheets and velvet pillows, but the rest of the room is off. The bedside lamps don’t match, and the one on the left is drawing the eye to observe the hideous pink seashell base. You notice the trinkets on the nightstands of a bug and a dog, and they don’t make sense. And the artwork has fallen into a rest-stop-bathroom motif of cheap frames and similar lakeside subjects. It feels manufactured, as if to look like a haphazardly put-together space, but with a feeling of meticulousness that makes the viewer uneasy.
Being uneasy is the point, though, right?
When the realtor leaves, he tells Tessa about the town curfew and to read the list of rules left on the fridge. It’s still a surprise when the air-raid siren goes off at dusk. Has Tessa landed in the purgatory of From? Could creatures be skulking about, waiting to replace her? The jury is still out. It’s also maddening that we only see the rules for a brief moment, because Tessa never even reads them.
Instead, Tessa investigates the basement her realtor told them not to, finding a stack of VHS and micro-cassette tapes. Being a documentarian, they become intrigued. But when the tapes reveal a possible crime, Tessa falls into a rabbit hole, obsessing over uncovering what happened.
The Trouble with Tessa’s first episode introduces us to three characters outside of Tessa, Simon the realtor, Betsy the neighbor (Maria Wolf), and Aaron (Cahlo), Tessa’s filmmaking partner. Aaron is Tessa’s rock, who, even though they left him to clean up the mess, continues to console and build Tessa up. Where Tessa may have felt like quitting twenty-four hours ago, in episode two, Tessa has bounced back, telling Aaron about their next project.
Betsy, however, is the more interesting character. Peering through windows and supplying a copious amount of cash to Tessa in a “Welcome to the neighborhood” sort of way is beyond off-putting. But for as perfectly as Betsy could fit into a Twin Peaks aesthetic, her wide smile and gentle tone provide a sense that she could rip Tessa’s throat out if the situation really called for it. I don’t trust Betsy. I don’t trust anyone who hands someone that much cash and isn’t related.
More characters are added to the fray in episode two as Tessa ventures into Lowrey. An unhelpful librarian (Tina Ann Brock) shows Tessa a microfiche machine, and to no one’s surprise, it takes them a second to get started. At first, the old newspaper articles don’t appear to show too much, except largely redacted comments on a fifty-year low crime rate, an overpopulation of animals, and a mine collapse, but as Tessa digs further, some darker stuff seems to invade the headlines before finding the articles they’ve been searching for.
This all seems as if we’re headed toward some sort of secret Boogens, but there are a lot of moving pieces in the periphery. The townsfolk’s comments, the articles, and the bumps in the night Tessa is hearing suggest that the perfect town of Lowrey is not as it seems. The second episode wraps with Tessa asking one too many questions, and the townsfolk not taking kindly to their inquisition. Tessa seems to have a target painted on their back heading into episode three, but there’s a lot more going on. Nothing has overtly hinted at what’s on the way or what the town is hiding beneath this digitalless haven. For me, that is the mark of a good show. I haven’t a clue about what to expect next, and that’s incredibly alluring.
The only problem I have with The Trouble with Tessa is that its runtime is ludicrously short. But, always leave ’em wanting more, right? On the other hand, it does stop episodes from getting dragged down by eye-rolling plotlines for filler. There’s not an ounce of fat to cut on this show, implying every moment has to be meaningful. Nonetheless, Dennis Cahlo and Bethany Watson have put together one hell of a two-episode premiere, where every part of the production appears to be firing on all cylinders. I am hooked, to say the least. If all these episodes had dropped at once, I would have finished the show in a single sitting. But, for now at least, whatever’s down in the mine could be anyone’s guess at this point.
The Trouble with Tessa begins streaming today, July 15, exclusively on Screambox.
The Trouble With Tessa / Trailer / SCREAMBOX Horror Series Premieres July 15
The SCREAMBOX Original Series “The Trouble With Tessa” is coming to the BD-powered horror streaming service on July 15. A six episode series (22 minutes each), “The Trouble With Tessa” centers on disgraced documentarian Tessa Fowler, who unearths a box of old tapes-one seemingly capturing a murder-and sets out to unravel the dark secrets buried in this perfect town’s past.
