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Emma (the amazing Mad Hot Ballroom’s Tara Devon Gallagher) is 11 and lives on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. When an accident takes away her ability to do the thing that defines her—swimming—she needs more than an operation to make it right. As her parents—Will (played with tenderness by Robert Knott), a tough waterman weakened by the struggle to make a living in the sick Chesapeake Bay, and Julia (the stellar Cherry Jones, who nails a stressed-out but deeply caring mom)—fall apart trying to come up with the money to pay Emma’s medical expenses, Emma is left in the shadows. Her two older brothers have their own problems. Clyde (Shawn Hatosy), the younger one, is a brand-new cop with his own shit to figure out, including why he didn’t get to “inherit” the family business like older brother Mike (Michael Mosley), another waterman scraping by. When Merrill (Sarah Paulson in smudged black eyeliner) skitters back to town after years away, Emma gets a confidant in a woman arrested by her own experience, but one who can relate when relations can’t. The thoughtful, painful, but heartening Swimmers offers a glimpse into the lives of the folks who live year-round in your vacation destination.

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