The Affair 

A struggling novelist and a young waitress strike up an extramarital relationship that promises to forever change the course of their lives.

Creators:

Hagai Levi, Sarah Treem

Stars:

Dominic West, Ruth Wilson, Maura Tierney

Won 3 Golden Globes. Another 2 wins & 19 nominations.

Cast

Series cast summary:
Maura Tierney	...	Helen Solloway 52 episodes, 2014-2019
Dominic West	...	Noah Solloway 52 episodes, 2014-2019
Julia Goldani Telles	...	Whitney Solloway / ... 52 episodes, 2014-2019
Jadon Sand	...	Trevor Solloway / ... 52 episodes, 2014-2019
Joshua Jackson	...	Cole Lockhart 43 episodes, 2014-2019
Jake Siciliano	...	Martin Solloway / ... 43 episodes, 2014-2019
Ruth Wilson	...	Alison Bailey 42 episodes, 2014-2018
Catalina Sandino Moreno	...	Luisa Leon 28 episodes, 2015-2019
Omar Metwally	...	Dr. Vic Ullah 25 episodes, 2015-2018
Leya Catlett	...	Stacey Solloway 22 episodes, 2014-2015

Storyline

At once deeply observed and intriguingly elusive, The Affair explores the emotional effects of an extramarital relationship. Noah is a New York City schoolteacher and budding novelist with a wife of twenty years and four children. Alison is a young waitress and wife from Montauk at the end of Long Island, trying to piece her life back together in the wake of a tragedy. The provocative drama unfolds separately from multiple perspectives, using the distinct memory biases of each character to tell the story. Created by Sarah Treem.

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Plot Keywords:

unfaithfulness | extramarital affair | adultery | infidelity | husband wife relationship | 

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Taglines:

Danger lies in losing control.

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

TV-MA

Details

Official Sites:

Showtime

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

12 October 2014 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Affair

Filming Locations:

Long Island, New York, USA

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Runtime:

60 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

At one point someone offers Noah a drink, saying, "Jameson ok?" Dominic West's character in The Wire only drank Jameson Irish Whiskey.

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Connections

Featured in WatchMojo: Top 10 Best TV Shows No One Is Watching (2017)

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Soundtracks

Container
Written and Performed by Fiona Apple

User Reviews

The psychological underpinnings of drive and desire

The Affair is one of the few recent productions on TV which deals with the hard psychology of man woman relations and its myriad entanglements. An affair between two married people is largely a narrative device through which the series explore what drives men and women to seek out risk, love, chaos and meaning throwing all the comforts of a "settled" life to the bin. Though there is a moralistic angle to it, but its kept at the sidelines with the primary focus being the psychological subtleties of love and betrayal. One can say that the series is heavily driven by pitch- perfect reactions of characters to each other and the ambiguity of desire. Jealousy and possessiveness haunts the characters in the initial part of the story where an affair, quite necessarily is creating new avenues for the intensity of desire to gush forth. There are lives being left behind in the promise of a better one and the collateral damage to the once dear. Season 1 is concerned with the question of carnality as a means to feel alive again. The greatness of the story lies in its astute understanding that men and women are similar in some ways and different in many others. Desire is the self trying to complete itself through another but men and women understand completeness differently many times and this creates timeless problems between them.

Season 2 deals with the aftermath of the affair and I think there is a lot said here about what are the fundamentals of any relationship which determines which relationship lasts and which fails. One of the most brilliant aspects of the second season is the way it brings out the life is approached differently by men and women. What gives life meaning is not a solved question and in pursuit of what one considers meaningful, we are ready to make many subtle self- deceptions. Many times, complexity is just weakness given a flair of rhetoric. At the end of our lives when we are less driven blindly to achieve and more likely to take a dispassionate view of life, much of what we called "complexities of life" will turn out to be a desire to avoid responsibility. Neither man nor woman has the absolute answer to what a good life is. Perhaps we can someday realize that its always in the middle that the answer lies. Mean while, The Affair can teach us how to reflect on these questions and find our own answers