Healing complicated grief – reflections on HBO series “Mare of Easttown”

I only recently got to finish the Mare of Easttown. and I already miss her. I was, among other things, deeply moved by the way the role of the protagonist was written and an extraordinary performance by Kate Winslet. Part of my own excitement comes from the desire to see authentic imperfect female characters on the screen more often – characters that intrigue me, to whom I get attached, who also annoy me a little. Ultimately – characters who evoke in me as many multi-layered and sometimes ambivalent feelings as life itself. Characters I want to know more about.

I am grateful to Kate for her contribution to the series, which, as far as I understand from the interviews, was at times a struggle with the production. Namely, Kate insisted that her wrinkles and stomach should not be treated, that she should not wear a bra when she just got out of bed (which, I guess, is still revolutionary :)), showing the reality of aging without any shame. It was a pleasure to witness it and indirectly experience her freedom of being.

Although it is a crime series, a psychologically well knit story of a complicated loss predominates the narrative. It may as well be as show about the power of the unfinished mourning process to lock us up. Mare lost her father as a child, and then, years later, her son. They both committed suicide. The trace of that pain and haunting guilt is present in every aspect and step of the protagonist, in her compromised capacity for emotional connection as well as in her dedicated efforts to resolve the cases of loss experienced by other mothers in the local community. Although her motives are noble, by trying to “save” other mothers and their children, she somewhat escapes confronting her own pain.

Kate is a master in conveying a sense of resignation in life when unprocessed loss can, in a way, feel like borderline depression. And all this without resorting to melodrama, even with a dose of humor. Just lIke Mare, Kate went to therapy while shooting the series. In one interview, she stated that she was so overwhelmed by the role that she took a year off after it and continued with the therapy in order to heal from everything she had to emotionally contain as Mare.

Finally, I liked how screenwriter Ingelsby deals with the crimes committed in the series. People accountable for them are not some distant and otherworldly elements or intruders but members of the community. As Baron-Cohen points out (and it seems more and more relevant to the moment in which we find ourselves in civilization): although each of us has a different capacity for empathy, each is able to “switch off” his capacity by transforming another human being in his mind into an “object” (an obstacle in the way of achieving one’s goals, a means of meeting one’s needs, etc.).

Situations where we witness or experience the collapse of empathy are, therefore, an issue of great importance for the health of our communities. The process in which Mare builds more compassion for herself in psychotherapy, and the parallel process by which her local community begins to heal, remind us of that once again.