Meghann Fahy is fast becoming the patron saint of the super-rich satire. First she played enigmatic trophy wife Daphne in The White Lotus, eventually becoming the stealth heroine of the show’s Sicilian second season. Then she cropped up in The Perfect Couple, the soapy Netflix murder mystery that took place on a staggeringly beautiful Cape Cod estate. Now she’s taking the lead in Sirens, another Netflix show set in the world of the 0.01 per cent, where the gorgeous ocean vistas can’t quite offset the lingering sense of unease.
Sirens is based on a play written by Molly Smith Metzler, who is the showrunner behind the 2021 mega-hit Maid. Here, Fahy’s character Devon isn’t a glossy socialite but a bemused outsider and fully fledged hot mess; it’s a role that allows her to show off her White Lotus comic timing, while grappling with emotional depths far deeper than anything The Perfect Couple offered her.
In time-honoured TV shorthand, Devon’s eyes are ringed with smudged eyeliner and her hair looks like she’s left a bit too much time in between root touch-up appointments. And if you don’t pick up on this subtle messaging, fear not: she’s also staggering out of a police station with her possessions in a plastic bag, wearing last night’s clothes.
When she arrives home, though, it’s the unexpected delivery of an edible arrangement that tips her over the edge. This towering bouquet fashioned from fruits (which looks very tasty, if anyone fancies sending me one) has been sent by her younger sister Simone (Milly Alcock). It’s a sorry-not-sorry for the fact that she has been ignoring Devon’s calls for help and refusing to share the burden of caring for their father (Bill Camp), whose moods and memory have been unsettled by early onset dementia. Stirred into action by this useless (but delicious!) fob-off, Devon jumps on the next coach to the picture-perfect coastal town where Simone now works.
Simone, we learn, hasn’t been picking up Devon’s calls because she’s managed to reinvent herself as the right-hand woman to kooky billionaire’s wife Michaela (Julianne Moore). She rules over her boss’s sprawling coastal mansion like Passive Aggressive PA Barbie, dressed in a series of cutesy Alice bands and pastel print shifts that belie her inner steeliness. Devon crashes into this manicured world like a flaming meteor. “There’s a transient person at the house asking for you,” one of Simone’s colleagues tells her upon her older sister’s arrival. “She’s carrying hot garbage”.
If at first Devon is simply baffled as to why “everyone look[s] like an Easter egg” in Michaela’s compound (thanks to all the flouncy, twee patterned dresses), she soon has greater cause for alarm. Simone is utterly in thrall to “Kiki”, as she’s come to call her boss. As well as organising her charity galas and accompanying her on morning runs, she “spray[s] her underwear with lavender mist” and helps Michaela compose sexts to her husband Peter (Kevin Bacon, in a rare, welcome foray outside of the EE advert extended universe). Sometimes they even sleep in the same bed.
With her weird birds of prey (wildlife conservation is her passion project) and dozens of lookalike followers, Kiki has the charismatic aura of a cult leader – and it’s very easy to fall under Moore’s spell. She effortlessly manages to embrace the high camp of her role, while also lending Kiki flashes of vulnerability and emotional insight; you can see exactly why a young, impressionable girl might latch on to her as a pseudo-mother figure. Devon soon becomes intent on breaking her sister out of her clutches. But Simone, who is dealing with her own troubled past, doesn’t want to be saved.
There is a lot going on in Sirens, crammed into five episodes that unfurl in a burst of chaotic energy. There’s Simone’s creepy older boyfriend, who wears blazers embroidered with tiny ducks, the brutal death of one of Kiki’s rescue birds, a few more jail stints (featuring a brilliant cameo from stand-up Catherine Cohen), and hints that Moore’s character might have supernatural powers. At the same time, there’s also a more serious exploration of sibling bonds and grief.
Inevitably, these disparate storylines sometimes jar with one another, and the tonal shifts can come at breakneck speed. Sometimes I found myself wishing that Devon and Simone’s relationship had been given a bit more space to breathe, because Fahy and Alcock have brilliantly believable sibling chemistry; the scenes where Simone allows her perfectly made-up mask to crack a little and leans on her older sister are especially powerful.
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As an eat-the-rich satire Sirens doesn’t entirely work; neither does it fully pull off its attempts to grapple with family dynamics and generational trauma. But as a colourful, unpredictable slice of slightly bonkers summer escapism? Like the siren songs of Greek myth, it’s irresistibly alluring.
