Jennifer Love Hewitt Shines in "The Client List"

 

How far would you go?

 

We all think there are lines we’ll never cross. But if your kids needed food and you were about to lose the house, would the oldest profession in the book start to look a little bit more viable?

 

Of course, you say no. Me, too. Sam Horton said no, too...until she didn't.

 

The Lifetime Original Movie “The Client List” premiering Monday, July 19 at 9pm et/pt is based on the true story of one Texas mom of three who stepped over the threshold of the unthinkable. Jennifer Love Hewitt stars in (and executive produced!) the movie, also starring Cybill Shepherd and Teddy Sears.

 

Hewitt plays Samantha Horton, a former Texas beauty queen and physical therapist. When both she and her husband Rex (Sears) are laid off from their jobs, she accepts an offer to work at a massage studio in a nearby town, not realizing that the other staff members are actually prostitutes. But not just run of the mill ladies of the night…they service a clientele of the local wealthy and powerful businessmen.

 

Eventually realizing what goes on behind closed doors, but desperate to provide for her family, Samantha goes along for the ride. When the police raid the business and Samantha is arrested, she ends up as a key witness in the case -- putting high-profile johns in handcuffs and bringing a small Texas town to its knees. 

 

Struggling through the biggest moral dilemma of her life isn’t easy, but Sam manages to keep her sense of humor throughout. One of my favorite scenes is when a man married to the town “Perfect Wife” comes in. The woman has always treated Sam like dirt, and she’s all too aware of it.

 

But she still can’t fathom engaging in conjugal acts with “Perfect’s” husband.

 

She says to him, “I know your wife!”

 

He replies, “She treats you like dirt- don’t you wanna stick it to her?”

 

And she fires back, “Not by you stickin’ it to me!”

 

I had to laugh.

 

Shepherd stars as her opinionated mother, Cassie. I’ve loved Cybill Shepherd since her "Moonlighting" days, and would love to know who she struck the anti-aging deal with. She looks amazing, and best of all, she kept her swagger. She shines as Sam’s Texas Queen to a T. Watching her thrash through her own culpability in her daughter’s career decision is compelling.

 

Of course, we’d all like to think the moral high ground is the easy one to take. Especially when we know it’s the right one. But "The Client List" illustrates beautifully how to boil a frog. By turning up the water one degree at a time. Before Sam admitted to herself the immense danger of the path she’d chosen, the hot bubbles were high around her ears.

 

Persuading yourself to a life of selling pleasures of the flesh isn’t QUITE like rationalizing a new pair of shoes, but Hewitt really shows the push and pull of Sam talking herself into it. The risqué career may or may not come up in every girl’s life, but the shoes! Now that’s a dialogue we’ve all faced at one time or another.

 

Ultimately, "The Client List" is a story about owning the choices we make, and how they affect others around us. And the bonds that remain even when the choices made didn’t take them into account. Teddy Sears does a truly masterful job of portraying a man wounded and betrayed…but at the heart level, still committed to the girl he fell in love with.

 

And that’s all I’ll give away…you’ll have to see the rest for yourself when the Lifetime Original Movie The Client List premieres on Monday, July 19 at 9 pm ET/PT.

 

Click here to see video from Partybluprints' screening party of "The Client List"!