Ropes & Gray lawyer roasts Netflix hit show’s portrayal of City law life

“I couldn’t help but laugh over much how they got wrong on the practice of corporate law”

A Ropes & Gray associate has taken to LinkedIn to sift through the inaccuracies of life as a corporate lawyer in the Netflix series Partner Track.

The show follows the young City lawyer Ingrid Yun’s attempts to get ahead in the race to become a partner at an elite New York City law firm.

Georgina Suzuki, an IP Transactions Associate who is based in Silicon Valley, wrote: “for fun I thought I would help set the record straight (sorry to disappoint all you potential law school students who aspire to a glamorous lawyer life)”.

In the comments she explains:

“I just wish TV were more reflective of reality. It shapes people’s views and decisions whether to pursue certain careers. A lot of people drop out of law school because it wasn’t what they imagined. You can say certain aspects of a tv show capture the “spirit” of the profession despite inaccuracies, but accuracy helps.”

For those who haven’t watched season one yet: WARNING, SPOILERS ALERT (though only very minor ones)! Suzuki’s post highlights eight City law myths that come out from Partner Track.

She notes the worrying levels of commercial awareness and legal knowledge displayed by lawyers on the show: “A sixth year M&A associate is shown falling asleep listening to a podcast about material adverse changes. Unfortunately, you are in trouble if you don’t know what a MAC/MAE is by then.”

Although many City law firms do have some cool perks, maybe don’t get too carried away with a romanticised image of enjoying ensuite offices, private plane trips and City skylines.

Suzuki vents: “As a senior M&A associate, you don’t just casually peruse documents on your stomach in your office gazing at the Manhattan skyline. You gotta work on your SPA markup, alone in front of your large dual screen monitor and cold pizza, while badgering specialist teams to send in their portions of the diligence memo.”

She also remains “incredulous that partners have massive private bathrooms attached to each of their offices” and stresses that “senior associates brief partners on red flags. But that generally doesn’t happen on private planes to Paris. There is email for that.”