A RISK WORTH TAKING

Without a job, is Dan a man?

His put-upon wife Jackie doesn’t think so. He’s been playing solitaire until all hours and oversleeping, just because his London dot-com company went belly-up . . . and, speaking of bellies, Dan doesn’t look so good in that tattered old T-shirt he oversleeps in. Yet Dan Porter was once a big success: a financial market maker in the City who moved into the tech sector only months before the boom went bust. And then came 9/11. At least he’s not the only guy out of work. His friend Nick Jessop has turned into a glorified kangaroo, carrying his baby with him wherever he goes and hoping to make a million reinventing a baby car-seat. Dan’s investments have plummeted, and Jackie’s the breadwinner now, feeling the strain of keeping two daughters in expensive schools, though their son, Josh, has dropped out of Manchester University to sleep all day, too, then frequent headbanger clubs at night. Gosh, muses Dan. Is everything his fault? Jackie thinks so. Unbeknownst to Dan, she’s being seduced by a suave accountant. Will Jackie leave Dan for Steve? Back to that in about six months as Dan heads to Scotland to meet plucky Kate, CEO of a prawn-fishing enterprise. Even though Kate’s husband has been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, she soldiers on, supplying tons of prawns to the UK and Europe. And she’s handy with a needle, too: the comfy playclothes she whipped up for her children has morphed into a successful fashion line that, however, isn’t widely distributed. Will Dan agree to market the line? Yup! Bitchy Jackie accuses him of infidelity: Is he the father of yet another woman’s baby, an American? No—but he’s supporting her and her child because she wasn’t married to his friend, who died in the World Trade Center, and so isn’t eligible for 9/11 compensation. Jackie leaves him anyway.

Contrived, unfocused, self-indulgent. The son of Rosamund has brought us two other tedious contemporary soapers (Starting Over, 2002, etc.).