Fall TV Preview

What’s It All About? Executive produced by Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese and Emmy award-winning writer (for The Sopranos) Terence Winter, this lush period drama is set in Atlantic City, N.J., in 1920, at the dawn of Prohibition. Ruling this luxury seaside resort town is its treasurer, Enoch “Nucky” Thompson (Buscemi), who consorts comfortably with both politicians and mobsters as he facilitates the flow of amusement, money and, of course, illegal alcohol.

The re-created Boardwalk itself is hidden behind shipping containers not far from the Brooklyn Navy Yard, with other historic locations all over New York City helping to create an era both familiar and utterly strange. It’s a world where the rich and poor, the respectable and the disreputable, rub elbows, where straw-hatted swells and their lace-swathed ladies are pulled along in wheeled wicker seats past attractions like the wild man of Borneo, a stilt walker in striped pants, fortune tellers and tiny infants on display in newly invented incubators.

As the story begins, Nucky’s former protégé (Pitt) is back from World War I, eager to reclaim his place in Thompson’s organization. But when things don’t move along quickly enough for him, he forms an alliance with some shady characters, which results in the Feds picking up Nucky’s scent.

If the acting and producing pedigree wasn’t enough to give it a try, the rich look and attention to detail, along with the combustible mix of crime, politics and sideshow weirdness, could make this the tonic for those missing Carnivále, The Sopranos and The Tudors.