Book I Rich: Book II Much Less Than Rich
With a daunting cast of characters, "Rich Man, Poor Man," Book I is a riveting miniseries, which follows the lives of two brothers. Peter Strauss plays Rudy, the older brother, who becomes financially rich but spiritually cold on his way to his goals. Nick Nolte plays Tom, the younger brother who has a run of abominable luck. First, physically abused by his father, portrayed brilliantly by Ed Asner, Tom meets up with a series of bullies, who, despite great effort, he is unable to avoid. When Tom's immature wife leaves him with their young son, Tom searches for him unrelentingly, even foregoing an opportunity to compete for a professional boxing championship. It is Tom's ability to fight that enables him to dispose of the various bullies who goad and confront him. During one of the most vicious fist fights ever filmed (It leaves me cold!!), Tom nearly kills, and probably shoud have, his worst enemy, Falconetti, whose character one loves to despise. William Smith creates a truly despicable Falconetti that I can imagine no one else duplicating. Tom is always financially poor, but he is always rich in spirit.
The story does not end in "happily ever after" fashion, but it leaves many life issues open for discussion. The plot, settings, character relationships, the uniformly brilliant acting make for top notch entertainment.
Book II follows Rudy's life as he goes after the corporate and political "bad guys" as Tom advises his older brother to do at the end of Book I. The plot of Book II becomes absurd and contrived, the lines predictable, the writing less sharp. Even the performances are far less powerful including those who played Wesley (Tom's son, Rudy's nephew), Billy,(Rudy's stepson), Diane, (Rudy's girlfriend's daughter), Kate, (Tom's widow). Peter Strauss is less convincing than he was in Book I, but it is difficult to determine whether it is caused by the melodramatic lines he was paid to deliver, or he simply was not as good. At any rate he did not provide the stellar performance he contributed to Book I.
Nonetheless I watched all of Book II if only to see how Rudy would extricate himself from the quagmire of problems presented to him by the writers.
In a few years I will watch Book I again. Book II will remain in my archives unless my children and/or grandchildren want to see it. I will highly recommend Book I; I will not not (Two "nots' are intentional.) recommend Book IIRead full review
