On four decades of Scott Turow’s Rusty Sabich
Why we’re still obsessed with the problematic prosecutor
With the release of Presumed Guilty, we’ve allegedly come to the end of the Rusty Sabich ride. Considering how Scott Turow’s famous fictional prosecutor – however problematic and philandering and immoral – has proven irresistible to the Wisconsin-based crime writer, it seems fair to ask, is this third novel really it? Turow laughs when I call his bluff: “Well, you could be right.”
After all, Apple TV+ just reintroduced Rusty to a whole new generation in its Presumed Innocent reboot (starring Jake Gyllenhaal), which promptly became the streaming service’s most viewed drama of all time. Director David E. Kelley took plenty of creative liberties and delivered a twist-twist-ending on Turow’s original, which even the author wasn’t privy to in advance. And with Season 2 already in the works, the Rusty Sabich of prestige TV is veering further and further off Turow’s track.
It’s an occupational hazard for the novelist, who’s all too familiar with his beloved character being interpreted and re-interpreted. In the 1991 Presumed Innocent film, Harrison Ford’s Rusty is lovable and forgiveable with an understated sense of humour; in the 2011 TV movie Innocent, Bill Pullman played him as vague and suspect; and, in the new series, a smarmy Gyllenhaal seems to have given up entirely on Rusty as a likable character. No wonder Turow, 75, is returning to our shelves, reclaiming his creation while he still can. “He is a jerk, but he knows it,” says the author, weighing in with his own interpretation, “and he’s got this deep sense of morality, even when he does deeply immoral things.”
Jerk or not, this flawed hero has long wormed his way into Turow’s heart. “There’s no voice in which I write that’s more natural than Rusty, and there’s more than a little commonality between Rusty and I.” He means the good parts, obviously: Both are semi-retired lawyers who love the law too much to stop. Both are happily re-coupled later in life. Both are deeply committed to who gets justice and who justice eludes.
In Turow’s 1987 novel, his rich, white, well-connected protagonist is indeed presumed innocent. But 35 messy legal years have seen Rusty’s world change. In the author’s 2010 followup, Innocent, the prosecutor-turned-judge was tried and found guilty and sent to jail for his wife’s mysterious death. Now, in Presumed Guilty, 75-year-old Rusty has been exonerated and freed and welcomed back to the bar. This time, he’s a defence lawyer, and since his new girlfriend’s adopted Black son has been charged with murder, naturally the veteran lawyer will be defending him pro bono.
Turow knows all this is a stretch, but somehow he makes it work. “I play by the rules,” he explains. More specifically, he plays by the law. “Everything that happens in my book could happen … even if it probably won’t.” And the Harvard Law School-educated scribe’s got a thing for acknowledging and explaining all the implausibilities in advance. When it’s suggested Rusty might represent his would-be stepson, the lawyer laughs out loud – then takes the case. Rusty explains why criminal defendants rarely and probably shouldn’t testify, then his defendant takes the stand. Because as much as Turow’s a lawyer, he’s a writer, too: “It just makes for a better book.”
Born and raised in Chicago (just like his South Side buddy, former president Barack Obama), Turow sets his novels in the familiar but fictional “Kindle County” and its cottage country-esque town of “Skageon” – all of which has a nebulous Midwest feel. “I’ve owned a house in southern Wisconsin for 30 years, so I’m deeply familiar with this terrain,” he says. And within these imagined settings, readers get a crash course in real-life legal strategy: Guilty clients are easier to represent than innocent ones. Hold onto your best evidence to avoid it being challenged and dismissed in advance. Never ask a witness a question you don’t already know the answer to. A lawyer who represents himself has a fool for a client.
No wonder Turow cringed when Gyllenhaal’s character did just that in last year’s dramatic season finale. “That was a bridge I just couldn’t cross,” he says. No spoilers, of course, but this rebooted Presumed Innocent-era Rusty has committed far greater crimes than a legal gaffe, and for better or worse, is now Hollywood’s problem. Meanwhile, the literary septuagenarian version still belongs to Turow – this one last time. Allegedly.
