Big Love

Big Love
File:Biglove 2.JPG The cast of Big Love
Created by	Mark V. Olsen Will Scheffer
Starring	Bill Paxton Jeanne Tripplehorn Chloë Sevigny Ginnifer Goodwin
Country of origin	United States
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	24 (list of episodes)
Production
Running time	approx. 50 min
Original release
Network	HBO
Release	March 12, 2006 – present

Big Love is an HBO television drama about a fundamentalist Mormon family in Utah that practices polygamy. Big Love stars Bill Paxton, Chloë Sevigny, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Ginnifer Goodwin and Harry Dean Stanton. It premiered in the United States on March 12, 2006 following the sixth season premiere of the popular HBO series The Sopranos. The second season began on Monday, June 11, 2007. The show has been renewed for a third season which begins in January, 2009.

The show was co-created by Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer who also serve as executive producers. Olsen and Scheffer spent two and a half years researching the premise of the show, with the intent of creating a fair portrayal of polygamy in America without being judgmental. The series theme song is "God Only Knows" by The Beach Boys; musical score for the series is composed by David Byrne. The score for the first season was composed by Mark Mothersbaugh.

Plot

The series revolves around Bill Henrickson, his three wives Barb (legal wife/first wife), Nicki (second wife) and Margene (third wife), and their combined family of seven children. Henrickson lives with his family in three neighboring houses in Sandy, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City.

Season 1

Season 1 introduces the main characters and revolves around the family's struggles to live their polygamous lifestyle while keeping it a secret from the outside world. While Bill goes about expanding his chain of home improvement stores ("Henrickson’s Home Plus"), he struggles to balance his three wives and his strained relationship with Nicki's father, Church prophet Roman Grant. From his compound on Juniper Creek, Roman seeks to gain a greater share of the profits from Bill's business ventures. Bill, who is resentful towards Roman for expelling him from Juniper Creek as a teenager, opposes this and joins with his brother Joey, a former NFL player who returned to Juniper Creek after drug addiction, to gain a seat on the church's board of directors, in order to undercut Roman's considerable influence and to maintain a level of autonomy from his controlling grasp.

Bill's first wife Barb is shown to be the anchor for the plural Henrickson family, but as the show progresses it is revealed that Barb has mixed feelings about the concept of polygamy and only her love for Bill makes her stay. Meanwhile, second wife Nicki (daughter of Roman) struggles to fit in with modern life outside the compound and her own desire for power within the family dynamic. Nicki compensates for her isolation by developing an addiction to shopping, leading her to become $60,000 in debt via credit card charges. Third wife Margene, 23 years old, meanwhile struggles to find her place within the family, as both Barb and Nicki look down upon her due to her youth and fertility, having given birth to two children via Bill and being pregnant with her third child.

Most of season one focuses on the family's struggle to keep their family's secret from their friends, neighbors, and co-workers. However, things come to a head when Barb is nominated for a "Mother of the Year" Award, resulting in her and Bill being outed as a polygamist couple. Meanwhile Joey's mentally unstable wife Wanda poisons Alby Grant (Roman's son and chief minion) when Alby discovers that Bill is using Joey as a pawn in his scheme to undermine Roman's power within the church and threatens the two.

Season 2

Season 2 picks up two weeks after the end of season one, as Barb temporarily leaves home before coming back. Though the outing does not damage the family's reputation and the Henrickson business, it causes Bill to decide to take steps to ensure his family's financial security by trying to buy an electronic gambling company called Weber Gaming.

The second season also expands upon the political battles at Juniper Creek. When Roman and his wife inform Alby that they are willing to allow Wanda and Joey to get away with their attempt on his life in exchange for using them as leverage against Bill, Alby alerts outside authorities who arrest Joey (who claims credit for poisoning Alby in order to protect Wanda) and ultimately leads to a raid of the compound.

Meanwhile Roman's newest intended bride, the fifteen year old Rhonda Volmer secretly leaves the compound to live with the Henricksons. The family is quick to take Rhonda in, thinking that she is an innocent trying to escape being forced to marry the elderly Roman. However, it quickly is revealed that Rhonda is a pathological liar and sociopath, who left the compound only to exploit Roman's legal troubles in order to get herself on TV.

The departure of Rhonda and Alby's actions lead to Bill manipulating Roman and the Greens (a renegade polygamist sect that operates on the fringes of society) against each other in order to claim Weber Gaming. Roman is shot by the Greens when the police finally try and arrest the Greens, forcing them to flee. With Roman hospitalized, Alby quickly seizes power and thanks to Rhonda's statements to the police, Roman is arrested by the police for violating the Mann Act. Alby's power is ultimately secured when he forces his mother to flee Juniper Creek (after realizing that she planned on using him as a puppet to secure her own power base at Juniper Creek) and Bill's refusal to challenge Alby's claim of prophethood in order to claim the position for himself.

In his family life, Margene and Barb fell out as the two wage war against the other for the "head wife" position, culminating in Margene encouraging Bill to bring a Serbian waitress, Ana, into the family as Bill's fourth wife. Margene befriended Ana after seeing Bill flirting with her.

Barb, after a tearful reunion with her estranged mother and a pep talk with Roman's wife, reasserts herself as first wife by outing the family as polygamist to her nosey neighbors and informing Bill that she will finally leave him once and for all if he tries to bring a fourth wife into the family.

Meanwhile, Sarah is seeking help in dealing with her family's lifestyle through a support group for ex-Mormons, leading to her falling for a man ten years her senior. While Sarah ultimately gives up her virginity to her new boyfriend (mainly to spite her father, who is indifferent towards Sarah's growing disdain for him and polygamy), Ben gives himself over to his father's views on polygamy. At the close of the season, Ben is dating twin girls from Juniper Creek whose goal is to marry one man between them, causing Barb to consider sending him away to live with her (non-polygamist) sister.

Season 3

The third season of Big Love will premiere January 11, 2009.

Cast and characters

Main Cast:

Actor	Role
Bill Paxton	Bill Henrickson
Jeanne Tripplehorn	Barbara Henrickson
Chloë Sevigny	Nicki Grant
Ginnifer Goodwin	Margene Heffman
Amanda Seyfried	Sarah Henrickson
Douglas Smith	Ben Henrickson
Harry Dean Stanton	Roman Grant
Mary Kay Place	Adaleen Grant
Bruce Dern	Franklin Harlow
Grace Zabriskie	Lois Henrickson
Joel McKinnon Miller	Don Embry
Shawn Doyle	Joey Henrickson
Melora Walters	Wanda Henrickson
Brian Kerwin	Eddie Henrickson
Matt Ross	Alby Grant
Daveigh Chase	Rhonda Volmer
Jolean Wejbe	Teeny Henrickson
Keegan Holst	Wayne Henrickson
Tina Majorino	Heather Tuttle
Branka Katic	Ana

Recurring:

• Garrett Grey - Ray Henrickson
• Aidan Gonzales and Andrew Gonzales - Joey Henrickson Jr.
• Wendy Phillips - Peg Embry, Don's wife, Home Plus head bookkeeper
• Kyle Gallner - Jason Embry, Don and Peg's son, Ben's best friend.
• Annie Fitzgerald - Verna, Don's second wife
• Renee Albert - Julep "Jo-Jo", Don's third wife
• Carlos Jacott - Carl Martin, neighbor, Pam's husband
• Audrey Wasilewski - Pam Martin, neighbor, Carl's wife
• Jodie Markell - Wendy Hunt, secretary for Bill
• Sarah Jones - Brynn, Ben's girlfriend
• Aaron Paul - Scott, Sarah's boyfriend
• Lawrence O'Donnell - Lee Hatcher, family attorney
• Jim Beaver - Carter Reese, business acquaintance of Bill
• Luke Askew - Hollis Green, patriarch of a rival polygamist group
• Ellen Burstyn - Nancy, Barbara Henrickson's estranged mother

Family tree

Orville Henrickson

Unnamed woman

Eddie Henrickson

Unnamed Dutton man

Nancy Davis Dutton

Unnamed Heffman man

Virginia "Ginger" Heffman

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Barbara "Barb" Dutton Henrickson

Cindy Dutton

Joey Jr. Henrickson

Sarah Henrickson

Benjamin "Ben" Henrickson

Tancy "Teeny" Henrickson

Wayne Henrickson

Raymond Henrickson

Aaron Henrickson

Lester Henrickson

Nell Henrickson

The United Effort Brotherhood

The show's fictional fundamentalist group, the "United Effort Brotherhood", or UEB, is similar to and was inspired by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) whose financial and legal wing is called the "United Effort Plan". The FLDS is one of the most prolific and well-known polygamist groups which regard themselves as the legitimate successors of the original LDS Church. Creators Olsen and Scheffer included a drive through the twin FLDS towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Arizona, as part of their research for the show. The raid on Juniper Creek is reminiscent of the Short Creek raid, an actual historic event from 1953 where Arizona state police and National Guard troops took action against polygamists in Colorado City.

Production and crew

Although set in Utah, the series is primarily filmed at the Santa Clarita Studios in Fillmore, California. The location used for filming "Henrickson’s Home Plus" scenes is The All American Home Center in Downey, California.

The mall scenes from Season one were filmed in the Fox Hills Mall, in Culver City, California. Other exterior shots are filmed in Downtown Salt Lake City, Utah and Sandy, Utah, as well as northeast Los Angeles, California.

The head writers for the series are the co-creators: Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer. The writing staff includes staff writers: Dustin Lance Black, Doug Jung, Eileen Myers, Jennifer Schuur, Doug Stockstill, Jeanette Collins & Mimi Friedman.

Directors of the series include many veteran directors from other programs on HBO and many with backgrounds with independent films include Rodrigo Garcia, Charles McDougall, Sarah Pia Anderson, Dan Attias, Burr Steers, Michael Spiller, Alan Taylor, Mary Harron, Steve Shill, Julian Farino, Michael Lehmann and Alan Poul (former executive producer of Six Feet Under).

The show's producers are Ann Holm, Ron Binkowski, Bernadette Caulfield, Angela Courtin, Jeanette Collins & Mimi Friedman, and Shane Keller. David Knoller. Executive producers are Olsen and Scheffer as well as Gary Goetzman and actor/writer/director Tom Hanks.

Episodes

Main article: List of Big Love episodes

Season	No. of episodes	First Airdate	Last Airdate
Season 1	12	March 12, 2006	June 4, 2006
Season 2	12	June 11, 2007	August 26, 2007

DVD releases

DVD Name	Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
Season 1	October 17 2006	April 27 2007	September 5 2007
Season 2	December 11 2007	TBA	July 2 2008

Reception

Metacritic rated the show a 72 out of 100, indicating favorable reviews.

Heather Havrilesky of Salon.com said of Big Love, "There are elements of this new series that have a quirkiness that might seem deliberate or overly clever against a different backdrop, but that feels natural in its own gracefully odd environment."

Time magazine's James Poniewozik named it one of the Top 10 Returning Series of 2007, ranking it at #5.

Awards

The second season was nominated for the Golden Globe for Best Drama Series in 2007. Bill Paxton was also nominated for the Best Actor in a Television Drama Golden Globe for his role as Bill Henrickson.

International broadcasting

Country	Alternate title/Translation	TV Network(s)	Series Premiere	Weekly Schedule
United States		HBO	12 March 2006	Sundays at 9:00pm (ET)
Canada		The Movie Network (East), Movie Central (West), Global Television Network	14 March 2006	Mondays at 10:00pm (ET) (The Movie Network) Thursdays on Global (check local listings)
Argentina		HBO
Australia		SBS TV	3 June 2007	Saturdays at 8:35pm
Belgium		Canvas (First run), BeTV (Reruns)	September 2006
Brazil	Amor Imenso	HBO	1 October 2006
Chile		HBO
Colombia		HBO
Czech Republic		HBO
Denmark		Kanal 4		Mondays - Thursdays 20.00
Finland		Nelonen	19 February 2007	Mondays at 9.00pm
France		Canal+	13 September 2007	Thursdays at 10:15pm
Guatemala		HBO	September 9 2007	Sundays at 9.00pm
Hungary	Hármastársak	HBO/HBO2	5 January 2007
Israel		YES+
Italy		Fox Life
Mexico		HBO
Netherlands		NET 5	28 May 2007	Mondays at 9.30pm
New Zealand		TV ONE		Tuesdays at 9:35pm
Norway		FEM	September 3 2007	Mondays at 9.30pm
Peru		HBO
Poland	Trzy na jednego (Three To One)	HBO, HBO2
Portugal		FX	2007	Season 2 Saturdays at 9:05pm and Wednesdays at 10:00pm (Season 1 reruns every day except Sundays and Saturdays at 1:00am, 11:35am and 3:25pm)
Romania	Dragoste mare	HBO
Scandinavia		Canal+
South Africa		M-Net
Spain		Canal+
Sweden		SVT	April 16 2008	Wednesdays at 10.00pm
Thailand		HBO HBO Signature	October 22 2007 October 8 2007
Turkey		Foxlife
United Kingdom		Channel Five (First run), Five Life (reruns)	June 2006	Mondays 22.00
Uruguay		HBO

See also

• Mormon fundamentalism
• The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
• Plural marriage

External links

• Official site
• Big Love at IMDb
• Template:Tv.com show