What American Crime tried to be.

So much more natural, unforced, organic--not trying to make huge points with every scene, hitting us over the head all the time. You have to strain to follow the dialogue sometimes, which is the way Simon likes it--he wants us paying attention.

Here's an embarrassing confession--throughout the 90's, I lived on the other side of Van Cortlandt Park from Yonkers--I used to walk there all the time. I never heard about any of this.

To most New Yorkers, Yonkers, which just begins, seamlessly, when you walk far enough north on Broadway, might as well be some offshore island nation. We know it's there, we've met people from there, but we just don't think about it much.