Few premises are as perfect a fit for a TV movie as this one: a young woman working as an escort knocks on a john’s hotel room door — and it’s answered by her dad. That’s the setup for The Ultimate Lie, in which Kristin Davis plays Claire McGrath, a rebellious college dropout turned prostitute.
When Claire is sent for a date with “Harold,” her secret life intersects with that of her father, esteemed law school dean and whoremonger Malcolm (Michael Murphy). They stare at each other in horror for several seconds before a shaken Claire wordlessly leaves.
At home later, Malcolm quietly confronts her: “I just wanna know one thing. Why? You’ve got everything in the world going for you. Everything a person could want. Why?” Claire looks at him defiantly (which is how, with few exceptions, she looks at everyone she interacts with) and responds “You go first, Dad. Why?”
Troubled escorts were a hot telefilm topic in 1996; also airing that year was Tori Spelling’s Co-ed Call Girl. The Ultimate Lie, despite its promisingly salacious subject matter, has a little trouble deciding if it wants to be about the dangers of prostitution (when Malcolm gets Claire fired from her agency, she accepts assignments from a menacing pimp) or the mundane problems of the McGraths.
Claire’s the black sheep in a family of overachievers. Besides her father, a calculating self-promoter with a chancellorship in his sights, there’s mother Joan (Blair Brown), a celebrated litigator who retired early in service to her husband’s ambition. Brother Ben (a strapping, earnest George Eads) is a student poised to follow in their parents’ footsteps. Tousling his hair at breakfast, Claire jokes “My buzzy, the lawyer. I just hope I get the family discount when you have to bail me out of jail.”
Malcolm, egotistical and overbearing, first tries to guilt Claire into silence. When that doesn’t work (“Do you have any idea what it would do to your mother if she found out about this?” is unpersuasive coming from him of all people), he resorts to insults and threats. “Haven’t you brought her enough grief already? Haven’t you caused enough trouble around here for 19 long years? This incident, you will take with you to your grave. She will never find out about this, do you understand? Never!”
As terrible as Malcolm is, his antagonistic and immature daughter isn’t much more tolerable. We’re told almost nothing about Claire other than she struggled in school and enjoys being the center of attention. One of the few things in Rob Fresco’s screenplay that rings true is when her parents reminisce about the time she came home with a nose ring: “Best thing we ever did was not pay any attention to her at all. Trust me, as soon as she realizes she’s not driving us crazy anymore she’ll get bored and get on with her life.”
Ben, who once idolized his father but whose ultimate loyalty is to his mother, speaks for the audience when he finally tells his sister to stop being difficult for two seconds; by then she has repeatedly tried to alienate relatives with provocative comments about her job. She’s also had countless confrontations with her parents, including this dramatic revelation to Joan, who just kicked her out of the house:
“Have you ever wondered why Dad has been so mad at me lately? Or how I know that he’s been cheating on you? It’s because I’m a prostitute. It’s true. I take money from men for sex. Now I’ll give you three guesses how Daddy found out about that.”
the ultimate lie (1996)
Davis does her usual exaggerated facial expressions in lieu of acting, but it’s defensible in The Ultimate Lie when she lacks a character to play. Veterans Murphy and Brown are more successful at creating something out of nothing. His arrogance and desperation, and Brown’s sadness and dignified resolve to salvage what’s left of her family, make this watchable, but barely. For a superior TV movie by director Larry Shaw check out the dark comedy Mother Knows Best, starring Joanna Kerns.
Streaming and DVD availability
The Ultimate Lie hasn’t been released on DVD in the US and isn’t currently available on streaming platforms. If you have a region-free DVD player (it won’t play on anything else) you can find a used Region 2 (UK) copy under the title Extreme Behaviour. Amazon has additional Kristin Davis films to rent, and some stream free with ads.
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… But wait, there’s more!
If you nab a copy of the DVD, be aware that the Region 2 edition has a silly, pointless edit: it includes brief nudity and explicit sex that was not in the original NBC telefilm. Kristin Davis kisses a client in a residential living room and then actors who look nothing like either of them (their builds, hair, hands, clothes, nothing matches) are suddenly having Cinemax sex in a sterile office setting. It’s absurd, lasts exactly 10 seconds, and was obviously intended for a very different audience than the women and gay men most likely to seek out The Ultimate Lie.
Cranky Lesbian is a disgruntled homosexual with too much time on her hands. Click for film reviews or to follow on Instagram.
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