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There’s a Gen Z Working Girl at the heart of HBO’s Industry
A scrappy young woman makes her way into the world of finance through less-than-legitimate means, finding would-be mentors, romance, and ultimately, success. In 1988, that woman was Tess McGill and the production was Mike Nichols’ Working Girl. In 2020, she’s Harper Stern (Myha’la Herrold), one of the leads in HBO’s finance drama Industry. The series, from first-time creators Mickey Down and Konrad Kay, isn’t actually an adaptation of the Melanie Griffith-led romantic comedy, but Harper’s story certainly mirrors Tess’. This Gen Z banker also has a head for business, a bod for sin, and a working-class background that forces her to dissemble in front of the “masters of the universe.”
Though Industry is much more of an ensemble drama, Harper is at the forefront for the first half of season one. She’s both our entry-point character and a cipher. In the pilot, her soon-to-be boss Eric (Ken Leung) notes that her state-school education puts her at a disadvantage next to all the Oxford and Cambridge grads vying for a spot at Pierpoint & Co., one of the most prestigious banks in London. Harper is unfazed, insisting that the world of finance is “the closest thing we have to a meritocracy.” You’d think that kind of wildly optimistic statement would mean she is promptly eaten alive once she starts working under Eric’s supervision. But Harper’s willing to do just about anything to succeed, and so are her fellow Pierpoint novitiates Yasmin Kara-Hanani (Marisa Abela), Robert Spearing (Harry Lawtey), and Hari (Nabhaan Rizwan.)
Lena Dunham directs the premiere, cultivating her knack for stories centered on a group of horny, searching, and self-centered twentysomethings. The Girlscreator captures the intoxicating energy of your first “real” job, and the impulse to let that work define or otherwise validate you. This is truer of Yasmin, an already-wealthy grad trying to get out from her family’s shadow, and Harper than it is of the middle-class Robert, who might as well have walked in off the street one day, for all the insight he has to offer. Hari is more committed—or obsessed—than all the rest, napping in toilet stalls between projects rather than heading home to his efficiency apartment. Mid-level and senior employees fill out the rest of Industry’s world, but the series’ focus is on this batch of new recruits, whose employment status at Pierpoint is only temporary. In order to snag one of the permanent spots, Harper, Hari, Yasmin, and Robert must endure cracks about their appearances and socioeconomic backgrounds, as well as show greater ingenuity than entrenched employees who pitched their last good idea in the 1990s.
