- Network: ABC
- Series Premiere Date: Jan 6, 2008
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Critic Reviews
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The new show from "Sex and the City" producer Darren Star, is a strained attempt to build another hit about four peacocky New York women who sip martinis and use the word "penis" as often as possible.
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The women aren't real, realistic, real-ish, real-esque or real-y. They don't even seem genuine in being fake.
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Because it's fun to watch the rich and mighty stumble and scheme, which novelists as diverse as William Thackeray and Judith Krantz have long known. In the first two episodes at least, the quality of the acting and the writing brings depth to what could so easily be the fetid shallows of life issues of the rich and famous
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The show feels recycled.
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Cashmere Mafia, on the other hand, proceeds as if it were written by someone very far away imagining a cold, hard city in which a woman can get a schmaltzy marriage proposal on a Monday and then be dumped five days later because she beats her fiancé out for a job.
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One reason it all works is the quality behind the concept.
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Pick your adjective--Predictable. Insufferable. Detestable. Tacky. --and it fits.
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Sadly, though, the cliches rack up even faster than the wardrobe changes.
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It's pretty easy to qualify as worst series of the year when the year is less than a week old, but ABC's yucky Cashmere Mafia sets the limbo bar so low, only the slackest skeevy show could slither under it before the ball next drops Dec. 31.
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Ignoring all that, shallow Mafia entertains in key moments.
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It seems Darren Star has moved away from the fantasy of the upwardly mobile professional woman who seizes life's pleasures for everything they're worth; his ABC dramedy proves, time and again, that every treasure we hunt for comes with a higher price not listed on any receipt.
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Mostly the series functions as an entertaining if pale sequel to its HBO prototype.
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The stars, all of whom have done better work in better projects, give it their all, but the show is too snide, condescending and unpleasant to be salvageable.
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Strictly viewed on its merits, though, Cashmere Mafia suffers from a too-familiar feel.
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The characters of Cashmere are utterly lacking in that quality, and it's not long before their self-absorption and selfishness become unbearable.
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A ho-hum knockoff of "Sex and the City."
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As confected by ABC, the gayest and girliest of the big networks, Cashmere Mafia is the brighter of two ["Lipstick Jungle" is the other], with an "Ugly Betty" flair for color and a "Desperate Housewives" air of camp.
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It affects a frisky aura of gamesmanship with its tight-knit friends (played by Lucy Liu, Frances O'Connor, Miranda Otto and Bonnie Somerville) as they send their distress-text signals to each other, meet up, hash out their obstacles--cheaters, competitors, cads and the clock--and plan their counterattacks.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 37 out of 45
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Mixed: 1 out of 45
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Negative: 7 out of 45
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VanessaHAug 18, 2009
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AndrewC.Aug 7, 2009
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LaurenS.Sep 5, 2008