Dope Thief (Apple TV+, Friday) is considerably more compelling than its unimaginative title would have you believe. The tale of two desperate hucksters making ends meet on the mean streets of Philadelphia, it benefits from top-level buddy movie chemistry between Atlanta’s Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura, the Brazilian character actor who memorably portrayed Pablo Escobar on Narcos.
They are Ray and Manny – scammers whose business model involves ripping off local meth dealers by dressing as Drug Enforcement Administration agents and staging fake drug raids. But their hustle goes amiss when they accidentally kick in the door of a major meth distribution centre – blowing the building sky high and leaving a trail of bodies in their wake.
Apple has become a trove of below-the-drama (it took years for word to get out about superior espionage romp Slow Horses) and Dope Thief is up there with its best shows. Its depiction of the opioid-ravaged Philadelphia underclass is grippingly gritty. Henry and Moura, just as importantly, are believable and endearing as well-intentioned reprobates in way over their heads (and who lie to themselves that they are some kind of Robin Hood figures).
There is also an engaging plot involving a mysterious drug lord. He calls Ray threatening various unspeakable punishments if he does not return the meth stash he and Manny swiped during their disastrous heist (the duo made off with enough concentrated meth to supply America’s eastern seaboard). Meanwhile, the backstories of the leads are movingly filed in. Kate Mulgrew plays Ray’s ailing adoptive mother and Ving Rhames, his incarcerated father. Philadelphia, for its part, hasn’t looked quite so post-apocalyptic since the original Rocky movie.
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Violent, funny and well-paced, Dope Thief would be a sure-fire smash on Netflix or Disney. There is, alas, every chance it will waste away in obscurity on Apple. That is a shame, as it’s that rare thriller that is both an engaging character study and a top-drawer caper.
It is also a shop window for Henry, who excelled as a struggling rapper in the often surreal Atlanta and comes into his own as the underdog hero of a methhead dramedy that lands like a chaotic mash-up of Breaking Bad and The Wire. Those were two of the greatest TV shows of the past 20 years, and while Dope Thief isn’t up there in terms of its dialogue or plot, it skates by on sheer charm and chutzpah and is worth investigating.
